tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-90689537452265410872018-03-14T16:31:30.206-07:00AnticitizenXAnticitizenXhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05041380277822761284noreply@blogger.comBlogger32125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9068953745226541087.post-33832090589173418092017-12-26T08:12:00.001-08:002018-01-15T19:16:43.013-08:00The Problem of Omnipotence<div style="text-align: justify;"><br />Imagine yourself relaxing at home one day when you suddenly hear a knock at the front door. To your amazement, it appears to be none other than John DeLancie himself, standing on your doorstep.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">"Hello.” he says. “My name is Q, from the Q continuum. Just stopping by to let you know that I’m an omnipotent god. You should probably start bowing before me or else I might get really upset."</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">"That's cool," you think. You've never met an omnipotent being before. But hey, he seems like a pretty honest guy, and you're probably not very keen on the idea of getting turned into a frog right now. So naturally, you take him completely at his word and start bowing right that second, am I right?</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">No, of course not! You’re skeptical. Maybe this person is telling you the truth, or maybe this person is just some weirdo pulling your leg. So you demand some basic empirical evidence to show that this being really is what he says he is.&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">“All right,” he says.&nbsp; “You want proof?&nbsp; You got it."</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The next thing you know, Mr. Q snaps his fingers, and, in a brilliant flash of light, your car is suddenly transformed into a giant pile of squirrels. It’s a very impressive trick to be sure and maybe even enough to warrant sincere placation of this being. However, we’re all hard-nosed philosophers around here, and we want to be as sure as we possibly can. So let’s put this guy to the test and see whether or not he truly deserves the title of <b>omnipotent</b>, rather than, say, <b>really-really awesome and powerful</b>.<br /><br />You might be forgiven for thinking that this was a perfectly straightforward question to ask, and in any other context it probably would be. But religious philosophy has a really funny habit of tripping all over itself whenever questions like this crop up. Because as simple and intuitive as this problem may seem, most religious philosophers cannot for the life of themselves seem to answer it coherently. It’s an elegant little thought experiment that perfectly captures the bizarre mental gymnastics of Christian apologetics, as well as some of the foundational failings of their entire philosophical world. It’s also a really fun exercise in basic critical thinking skill that takes us over a surprisingly broad spectrum of interesting philosophical subjects. That's why I personally find this question to be so strangely fascinating and why I think you'll enjoy following me down the looming rabbit hole that it represents.<br /><br />To begin our analysis, let's frame the question in terms of something a little more mundane. Rather than claim to be a full-on omnipotent deity, suppose instead that our stranger merely claims to be a reasonably competent automobile mechanic. It's basically the exact same situation as before, but now framed in a completely nonreligious context. So ask yourself now: <b>How exactly should we go about verifying this claim?</b> After all, it’s not like we just take random people completely at their word for this stuff. There’s real money at stake here, plus the functionality of our cars. Surely there must be some sort of test we can offer before honoring him with such a title, right?</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Obviously, the answer is yes, and it works like this. Go get out a piece of paper and write the following words that the top:</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b>Things That a Competent Automobile&nbsp;</b><br /><b>Mechanic Should be Able to Do.</b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">After that, you just enumerate the list with a collection of pertinent challenges. For example:</div><ol><li>Change a tire.</li><li>Change oil.&nbsp;</li><li>Flush coolant.</li><li>... </li></ol><div style="text-align: justify;">… and so on until you’ve completely populated the list. Once finished, you can then issue your challenge in the following fashion:</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><i>Dear Mr. Stranger.</i></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><i>Given the proper tools, work space, assistance, etc, I challenge you to complete each of these items on my list within a reasonable amount of time. Or, if the list is infinite in length, then at least complete a reasonable sampling of items until I'm satisfied.</i><br /><br />There, done. If our subject is successful, then great. He has officially earned himself the title of <b>competent automobile mechanic.</b> And if not, then oh well. Maybe he's just <b>pretty good with cars</b> or perhaps <b>halfway decent</b>. That’s fine, too. They're just words and labels.&nbsp; </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Now to be fair, this isn’t exactly how we all go about our daily lives, but it does illustrate an important philosophical aspect over the nature of language. Doctors, lawyers, presidents, squirrels, rocks, potatoes---they're all just labels that we define and assign in accordance with a distinct set of empirically verifiable properties. Anything that demonstrates the properties of a given list may officially earn the corresponding title, while things which fail to satisfy those properties are simply not referred to as such. It’s basically a form of philosophical <b>verificationism</b>, and it represents a foundational pillar on which human language operates.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">With that in mind, let’s go back to our supposedly omnipotent friend, Mr. Q. Start by getting out a piece of paper and writing the following words that the top:</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b>Things That an Omnipotent Being Should Be Able to Do</b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">What items go on the list now? The answer, it turns out, depends a lot on who you ask. For example, according to one school of thought, the answer is pretty simple: <b>Anything</b>. Literally anything you can think of goes on the list.</div><ol><li>Make it rain frogs? Check!</li><li>Create a married bachelor? You got it!</li><li>Flargle a snuffin? Sure, why not?</li><li>...&nbsp;</li></ol><div style="text-align: justify;">This is a naïve form of omnipotence commonly referred to as <b>absolutism</b>, or <b>absolute omnipotence</b>. Rene Descartes was a famous defender of this position, and even some modern philosophers have periodically defended it as well [1]. It’s actually pretty easy to see where this idea comes from, given that the Bible itself practically screams this interpretation at you. For instance,</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><ul><li>Matthew 19:26---With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.</li><li>Mark 10:27---With man it is impossible, but not with God. For all things are possible with God.</li><li>Luke 1:37---For nothing will be impossible with God.</li><li>Job 42:2---I know that you [God] can do all things, and that no purpose of yours can be thwarted.&nbsp;</li><li>Philippians 4:13---I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me </li></ul></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Despite its intuitive basis on Christian scripture, the idea of absolutism is clearly riddled with problems. For example, take the challenge of Flargling a Snuffin. According to absolutism, Mr. Q here should be perfectly capable of doing exactly that without a second thought. Yet, as should be obvious by now, <i>flargle </i>and <i>snuffin </i>are just gibberish words I made up out of nothing---<b>they have no established definition</b>. So pray tell, what exactly could our subject ever do that would satisfy the challenge?</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Bear in mind now that this is not a limitation on our subject per se, but a simple problem of language. It’s like mashing my keyboard with random characters and saying “here, do this!” There’s simply nothing to do. I may as well just stand there in silence, or perhaps shrug my shoulders and grunt. Mr. Q cannot ever hope to fulfill a challenge if no coherent challenge was actually given.&nbsp; </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Notice that a similar argument also applies to the challenge of creating a married bachelor. By definition, a bachelor is an unmarried man, which means the creation of a married bachelor is the same thing as creating <b>a married man who is also not married</b>---a logical contradiction. The set of all things that are married is mutually exclusive to the set of all things that are not married. It therefore doesn’t matter what Mr. Q ever presents to me because the rules of logic forbid me from ever recognizing a successful outcome. Again, that’s not a limitation on our subject, but another limitation on language itself. The very words used to formulate the challenge are simply put together wrongly.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">This is exactly why absolutism is generally regarded as a pretty terrible form of omnipotence. Nevertheless, it is important to recognize that <b>the death of absolutism does necessarily imply the death of God.</b> All it says is that, whatever things are out there for us to give labels to, none of them will ever be able to demonstrate omnipotence to any rational satisfaction. And since no being can ever possibly earn itself such a title (even in principle), the title itself is essentially meaningless. If, however, we simply redefine omnipotence to mean something slightly different, then all of the problems we just talked about would immediately vanish in a puff of logic.</div></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Remember now that all we’re trying to do here at the end of the day is define a word. If that word is coherent, logical, and verifiable, then great. We can use it to describe various entities in our environment, if and when we ever happen to encounter them. But if the word is incoherent or logically inconsistent, then oh well. It’s not like the universe cares one way or the other. All it means is that we can't use the word to meaningfully describe stuff. Time to go back to the drawing board and see if we can’t think of something better.<br /><br />Much to the credit of religious philosophers today, that seems to be exactly what happened. Rather than literally be capable of doing anything, a far more common view of omnipotence is <b>the ability to do all that is logically possible</b> [2]. It’s a perfectly straightforward revision that specifically seeks to avoid the incoherence of absolutism while still preserving the totality of power we've come to expect. And that’s a good thing! So let’s all get out a piece of paper and write the following words at the top:<b><br /></b></div><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>Logically Possible Actions</b>&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />What exactly does this mean? How do we determine whether or not some particular task should go on the list?&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Here’s how I interpret it.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Consider a simple challenge like “eat a taco.” If I can imagine some logically possible world wherein that task is being performed by some agent, then good. It goes on the list. For example, I can imagine a logically possible world where it is true that the President of the United States is eating a taco. Therefore, it seems to me, it must be logically possible to eat a taco. It is officially something that can be done, and therefore it must go on the list. Anything that wishes to call itself omnipotent must therefore be able to replicate that feat.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">That was easy enough. So let's shake things up a bit by asking a very simple question: <b>Is it, or is it not, logically possible to tell a lie?</b><br /><br />Obviously, the answer has to be yes, because people around the world tell lies all the time. Therefore, by modal axiom B [3], it must be logically possible to tell a lie. Therefore, by the definition of omnipotence, all omnipotent beings must be able to tell lies. Strangely enough, however, the Holy Christian Bible says outright that lying is something God cannot do; not just something God doesn’t do or chooses not to do, but literally <b>cannot </b>do.</div><ul><li>Titus 1:2 “[I]n hope of eternal life which God, who cannot lie, promised before time began.”</li><li>Hebrews 6:18---“[I]t is impossible for God to lie.”</li></ul><div style="text-align: justify;">So right off the bat, the very definition offered by professional Christian philosophers themselves has immediately precluded their very own God from being omnipotent! Isn't that funny? But let's ignore that little problem anyway and see what else can we find wrong with this definition. &nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />How about this? Go outside and start collecting rocks into a giant pile. Keep piling up rocks until the pile is so heavy that you cannot ever hope to lift them. Congratulations! You have just created a finite pile of rocks that officially satisfies the description of being <b>unliftable by its own maker</b>. Therefore, it must be logically possible to create a pile of rocks, or even a single rock, that satisfies the description of being unliftable by its own maker. Therefore, all omnipotent beings must be able to replicate this task. So let’s pose the challenge.<br /><br /><i>Dear Mr. Q, <br /><br />I challenge you to create a finite rock such that its own maker cannot lift it. Go.</i><br /><br />So far so good, right? But what happens if Mr. Q actually succeeds in this challenge? After all, last time I checked, it is always logically possible to lift a finite rock. <br /><br />Notice that this is just a simple variation on the paradox of the stone---Can God create a rock so heavy that even God Himself cannot lift it. It’s a famous philosophical challenge to the idea of omnipotence because it logically prevents any being from ever demonstrating such a property. By definition, all omnipotent beings must, at any given moment, possess the power to both create rocks and to lift rocks subject to specifications. Yet the moment our subject creates a rock he cannot lift, he cannot possibly satisfy the definition of omnipotence any more. That means no being can ever possibly earn the title of omnipotence because the very act of proving it requires them to not have it. <br /><br />Notice also that we could just as easily frame this exact same problem any number of ways. For example, one of my personal favorites is to stand before a podium and truthfully speak the words “I am not omnipotent.” Again, it’s a perfectly logical task, in that I can imagine a logically possible world where this is taking place. Therefore, at any given moment, an omnipotent being must, by definition, be able to replicate that task---<b>stand before a podium and truthfully speak the words “I am not omnipotent.”</b> Unfortunately, the only way to actually possess such a power is by not being omnipotent!<br /><br />Bear in mind now that this is not some clever philosophical trick, but a fundamental property of binary propositional logic. <b>Self-referential propositions, when coupled with logical negations, tend to produce really nasty inconsistencies.</b> It's the exact same reason why we have so many other famous paradoxes as well. For example, the Liar’s Paradox, Russel’s Paradox, the Halting Problem, and even Godel’s Incompleteness Theorems are all just similar manifestations of self-referential negation. So it’s not like I’m just making this stuff up, because philosophers, logicians, and mathematicians have been studying this exact same phenomenon for centuries. We therefore must conclude that <b>the capacity to do all that is logically possible is, ironically, not a logical possibility</b>. You can either be complete, or you can be consistent, but you cannot have both simultaneously.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />At this point, you would think that most Christians would simply say something like, “why yes, that seems to be a bit of an issue. Perhaps my conception of omnipotence is just a little bit too greedy. Let’s maybe learn from the last 100 years of mathematical logic and see if we can’t find something a little less contradictory.” But of course, the exact opposite is generally true, with hack philosophers around the world dogmatically clinging to their precious definition anyway.<br /><br />For instance, one complaint that you might hear is how the challenge itself is inherently ambiguous. When I create a rock, the word "maker" refers to myself, the person speaking to you right now. Yet when someone else performs the same task, the meaning of “maker” suddenly changes. On other words, the challenge shares the same <b>type</b> of proposition, but not the same <b>token </b>[4]. Thus, in order for the challenge to be comparable, Mr. Q would not need to create a rock that <u><b>he</b></u> cannot lift, but only create a rock that <u><b>I</b></u> cannot lift. <br /><br />This may sound like a somewhat reasonable point at first, but quickly falls apart the moment you actually stop and think about it. For starters, we don’t have to use the word “maker” if we don’t want to. We could have challenged our subject to create a rock so heavy that no being in the universe can lift it. Or better yet, stand before a podium and truthfully state the proposition that “There are no omnipotent beings.” They’re still logically possible actions in some logically possible world, which means they still have to go on the list. <br /><br />The real problem, however, is that <b>all </b>actions are inherently self-referential. To see why, simply imagine what would happen if I challenged you, right now, to eat a taco. Naturally, if you’re like most people, the obvious interpretation of that task is to immediately grab a taco and start shoving it into your face. If, however, you were to then challenge me to replicate that task, what exactly do you imagine happening next? Do I begin shoving a taco into my own face? Or must I literally shove a second taco into <b>your </b>face and force <b>you </b>to eat it?<br /><br />Obviously, the former interpretation is the correct viewpoint, because that's how every English-speaking human on the planet understands it. The whole point of issuing the challenge in the first place is to see if you have the power within yourself to replicate a power that I had within myself. Yet, for some strange reason, the moment we try to apply this same line of reason within a religious-philosophical context, then all of a sudden people start acting like a bunch of pedantic morons. By invoking the type/token distinction in this way, it is literally meaningless for me to challenge you to "eat a taco." I have to instead say something horribly obtuse, like "I challenge you to bring about the event of you eating this taco."<br /><br />Well I'm sorry guys, but events are not the same thing as actions, and I should not have to specify a particular actor in order to coherently define some particular act. When you challenge me to jump five feet in the air, you obviously mean that I have to propel myself with my own legs off the ground beneath me. If, however, I then challenge you to jump five feet in the air, then obviously you must now propel yourself off the ground with your legs. All logically possible actions are, in some way or another, inherently self-referential. Deal with it.<br /><br />With that taken care of, the next most common objection I tend to hear is that omnipotence doesn’t really mean the ability to do all that is logically possible. Rather, it means something more like <b>the ability to do all that is consistent with one’s nature</b>. That is to say, if the proposition “Y is doing X” is logically self-consistent, then for an omnipotent being, it will always be true that “Y <b>can</b> do X” [5].&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Okay, fair enough. If you want to just summarily change the definition of omnipotence again, then that’s great. It was a bad definition from the get-go, and we can only grow as philosophers by trying to find something better. But can we please all be grown-up enough to admit that this is nothing more than an indirect admission of defeat? The previous definition was inherently flawed, and so now we’re changing it into something else. Yet whenever I talk to Christian apologists about this, they almost always pretend as if the new definition is really what it was supposed to be all along, and how dare I straw-man such brilliant thinkers by ever suggesting otherwise!</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Fine. Whatever. Let’s just roll with it and see what we find this time, shall we? Can an omnipotent being tell a lie or what?</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />Typically, the answer to this question is that <b>it depends on the being</b>. For example, the God of Christianity cannot tell a lie because doing so would contradict His perfectly honest nature. Thus, to ask God to lie is the logical equivalent to asking a perfectly honest being to not be perfectly honest---apparently, a logical contradiction. But don’t worry, God still gets to be omnipotent anyway because He can still do all the things that are consistent with his divine, unchanging nature. Likewise, God cannot stand before a podium and shout “I am not omnipotent” because that would produce a contradiction as well. Omnipotence is an inherent part of God's nature, so therefore it doesn't have to go on the list of things God can do. Bam. Problem solved!<br /><br />This is usually the part where I begin to lose all patience with religious philosophers, because responses like this are clearly not well thought out. It really gets under my skin, too, because it represents a profound laziness that makes no effort whatsoever to consider the practical implications of what is actually being said. To illustrate, simply imagine God Himself standing on my doorstep in all His glory, when I issue the following challenge: </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><i>Dear God.&nbsp;</i></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><i>I challenge you, right now, to tell me a lie. Tell me that you’re a potato. Go.</i></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Pray tell, what exactly do Christians imagine happening next? Because as far as I can tell, they seem to imagine something like that scene from <i>Liar Liar</i> where Jim Carry tries to say that the pen is red, but just can’t bring himself to do it [6]---as if some invisible, metaphysical force of honesty is somehow preventing the words from coming out of his mouth! Call me crazy, but I hardly find that to be consistent with the idea of unlimited potentiality. Or maybe Christians just imagine God standing there with a dumb look on His face, as if He didn’t even understand the question? Or what if he just says “I’m sorry, but that would violate my essential nature. No thanks.” What in the hell am I supposed to do with that?<br /><br />But let’s take it one step further. Suppose you challenge me to lift a 1000-lbs car over my head---except that ooh, I’m sorry, but that would violate my essential nature! You see, I’m a being comprised of physical muscle mass that can only lift 200 lbs. When you ask me to lift 1000 lbs, then you’re asking me to perform a contradiction---<b>A being that cannot lift more than 200 lbs is lifting more than 200 lbs.</b> Not only that, but any challenge you give me can be counteracted in the exact same way. <b>No being can logically be expected to do the things it cannot do.</b><br /><br />So congratulations, my dear Christians! You’ve solved the omnipotence paradox. All you had to do was replace it with the <b>omnipotence tautology.</b> Literally anything and everything in the universe is now omnipotent because nothing can ever logically do the things it cannot do! </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />“Aha!” I hear you saying. “It is only incidental that you cannot lift 1000 lbs. I can still imagine a possible world wherein you are lifting 1000 lbs over your head. Therefore, it may be logically possible, but not physically possible!"<br /><br />Actually, no. What you're imagining right now isn't me. It may be an entity very similar to me, but that's not really me. Because as we just established, I am not a being who can lift 1000 lbs over my head.<br /><br />Or better yet, let's play that game in reverse. I can imagine a possible world wherein God is telling a lie. Now what? <b>What’s the difference?</b> Why is lying a violation of God’s essential nature, but lifting 1000 lbs is totally consistent with mine? Because as far as I can tell, this entire line of reasoning appears to be nothing more than blatant special pleading. When God can’t do a thing, then it must be because it violates His essential nature. Yet when I can’t do a thing, then apparently it’s little more than a conditional happenstance of my feeble, limited existence. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />So once again, we have another example of <i>responding </i>to an argument without any effort to actually <i>address </i>the argument. But the thing I find absolutely hilarious about this new definition is how (of all people) <b>the famous apologist Alvin Plantinga himself</b> personally debunked it as far back as the 1960s [7]. All you have to do is imagine a man called Mr. McEar, who just so happens to have one essential property---he has only the power to scratch his ear, and nothing else. Thus, by definition, any other task you challenge him to complete is a logical violation of his essential nature. Hardly an “all-powerful” being, wouldn’t you say? Yet, according to our new definition, Mr. McEar is still just as omnipotent as almighty God Himself!<br /><br />All tangents aside, the real problem with this whole “essential nature” nonsense is just that: <b>essentialism</b>---the idea that there exists some kind of intrinsic “essence” to things that makes them what they are. It’s a perfectly natural bias through which human beings tend to look at the world, but it’s still completely bogus. Ever since the Greek philosopher Plutarch introduced the Theseus paradox back in the first century [8], philosophers have had very good reasons to reject essentialism as a worthless, incoherent concept. A chair does not have some magically objective “essence of chairness” that makes it a chair. It’s just some arrangement of physical material stuff that human beings have arbitrarily decided to sit on and call a “chair.” Likewise, there is no such thing as “essence of Godliness” that would make God “God.” Rather, there is only a distinct collection of empirically verifiable properties which, if demonstrated, would earn some lucky entity the official title of “God."<br /><br />So not only do we have Christians pushing yet another idea of omnipotence that just doesn’t work, but it’s grounded on philosophical presumptions that have been categorically debunked for almost two thousand years. However, it really needs to be emphasized that all of these crazy problems would vanish in a heartbeat if only the theists would just stop insisting on such bungled definitions. It’s sad, too, because it’s really not that hard to come up with something relatively functional. So let’s do the theists’ job for them and just define omnipotence in a way that isn’t stupid, shall we?</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b>Omnipotence: the capacity to create, destroy, and rearrange matter/energy in accordance with arbitrary whims.&nbsp;</b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">There. Done! If we ever encounter any being with this kind of power, I will be more than happy to refer to such a being as “omnipotent.” Can he create rocks? Sure. Can he lift rocks? Absolutely. But can he create a rock so heavy that even its own maker cannot lift it? Nope. Not a chance. But guess what? That’s perfectly okay, because it's still logically consistent with the stated definition.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Notice how a definition like this also solves all kinds of goofy philosophical issues. For example, one lesser-known problem with omnipotence is the problem of creating two omnipotent beings at once. So let’s imagine a possible world wherein two beings are both competing for the official title of “omnipotent deity.” All we have to do is make a game out of it. Challenge one guy to turn my car into a pile of squirrels while challenging the other guy to turn it into a sack of potatoes. Whichever outcome occurs will then determine which guy is the loser and which guy earns the title. Done.&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Or better yet, let’s consider another lesser-known problem. I challenge you to truthfully tell me what I ate for dinner last year. You’ll notice that this is not really so much a test of power, but rather a test of knowledge. Yet according to most classical definitions for omnipotence, there is no distinction. The omnipotent being must be able to do it because I formulated the challenge as a logically coherent action. If, however, we adopt the new definition, then it is now possible for a being to be omnipotent, but not necessarily omniscient. All-powerful and all-knowing are now philosophically distinct concepts, as we should reasonably expect.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Notice also that there are still many possible ways to potentially break the definition. For example, could an omnipotent being create another omnipotent being? Or what if I challenge the being to kill itself? Would that violate the definition? Maybe, maybe not. But you’ll notice that I’m not racking my brain with obtuse rationalizations just to protect a stupid definition. If it works, then great. It not, then oh well. We'll just think of something better.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The ultimate irony in this entire discussion is that, when all is said and done here, I’m basically just fixing the theists’ philosophical problems for them. Yet if past experience is any guide, the overwhelming majority of them will never see it that way. Instead, they’ll probably view this entire discussion as a literal attack on God Himself, as if the words used to describe some possible entity might have real power over whether or not it actually exists. That’s what happens when you live your life defending dogma rather than honestly searching for a better understanding of the world. But the thing I find really embarrassing about this entire debate is that by clinging to their philosophically warped definitions, it is the Christians themselves who are logically forcing their God squarely into the realm of nonexistence. Even if there were a God-like thing somewhere out there in the cosmos for us to meet, the rules of language would prevent us from ever rationally calling it such.<br /><br />Thanks for reading. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b>Notes/References:</b></div><ol><li>Earl Conee, "The possibility of power beyond possibility," Philosophical Perspectives, Vol. 5, pp 447--473 (1991)</li><li>See, for example, the <a href="http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/11251c.htm">Catholic Encyclopedia</a> or the <a href="http://www.iep.utm.edu/omnipote/">Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy </a>"S is omnipotent =df S can perform any action A such that A is possible"</li><li>If X is true in the actual world, then X is necessarily possible. </li><li>See, for example, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pfkC_z1ZmfE">this</a> video here<br />See also <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Type%E2%80%93token_distinction">Type-token distinction</a></li><li>(<a href="http://www.placefortruth.org/content/omnipotence">PlaceForTruth.org</a>) "When used of God, it refers to fact that He is all-powerful, that He is unconstrained by any outside force; He can do anything consistent with His character." <br />(<a href="http://od is infinitely able to do all things that He desires to do, but must at all times be consistent with His perfect attributes or essence.">GraceBibleChurch</a>) "God is infinitely able to do all things that He desires to do, but <b>must at all times be consistent with His perfect attributes or essence</b>."</li><li>Plantinga, Alvin. 1967. "God and other minds: a study of the rational justification of belief in God." Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press. </li><li><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ship_of_Theseus">Ship of Theseus</a> </li></ol><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div>AnticitizenXhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05041380277822761284noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9068953745226541087.post-78704990976427194822017-08-19T09:48:00.003-07:002017-08-19T09:48:44.609-07:00Philosophical Failures of Christian Apologetics, Part 10: Other Religions <br /><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">So does God exist or not?</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Well, hopefully, if you've been paying attention up to this point, the answer is pretty obvious.&nbsp;<b>No. Don't be ridiculous.</b>&nbsp;The very idea of God is already a hopelessly incoherent mess unto itself, meaning the very notion of His entire existence can be utterly disproved through exercise of pure reason alone. But even if someone actually did manage to provide a logically viable conception for a word like "God," then the burden of proof would obviously lie with theists to empirically demonstrate that God's existence and not with atheists to negatively prove the contrary. Until that burden is actually met, the complete lack of evidence alone would again justify the strong assertion that there is no such thing as God.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">But hey, let's be generous and just assume outright that the theists are correct anyway.&nbsp;God is a logically coherent thing manifest in objective reality as a powerful, sentient agent. He created the universe, He created all life as we know it, and He personally intends to judge us for&nbsp;our Earthly compliance with the&nbsp;doctrines of His one true religion.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Can someone please now tell me <b>exactly which religion is that supposed to be?</b></div><ul style="text-align: justify;"><li>Islam?</li><li>Hinduism?</li><li>Zoroastrianism?</li><li>Christianity?</li><li>Judaism?</li><li>Shintosim?</li><li>Sikhism?</li><li>Jainism?</li></ul><div style="text-align: justify;">All of these religions claim absolute certainty about the correct nature of the one true God (or Gods), and many of them even threaten us with eternal damnation for accidentally believing the wrong one. So how exactly are we supposed to tell which one of these is the correct path to salvation as opposed some soul-destroying concoction of fallible, human corruption?</div><div style="text-align: justify;">Obviously, we can't.&nbsp;None of these religions have any epistemic advantage over the others, and it's almost entirely a matter of cultural upbringing as to which one people happen to pick. But hey, let's ignore all of that, too, and just assume anyway that the one true faith is indeed Christianity.<br /><br />Now what? Which <b>denomination</b>of Christianity am I supposed to follow?</div><ul style="text-align: justify;"><li>Catholic?</li><li>Pentecostal?</li><li>Baptist?</li><li>Mennonite?</li><li>Lutheran?</li><li>Mormon?</li><li>Anglican?</li><li>Adventist?</li><li>Methodist?</li><li>Quaker?</li><li>Presbyterian?</li></ul><div style="text-align: justify;">Remember now, our immortal souls are at stake, here! One bad choice could easily mean the difference between eternal, heavenly bliss or endless hellfire and damnation. Yet there are dozens, if not hundreds, of denominations for us to choose from within Christianity alone. So what compelling argument can anyone possibly hope to offer that proves the veracity of any one faith over another? At the very most, only one of these God concepts can rightfully be considered correct, while all other variations necessarily must be the product of human imagination. Yet if everyone else believes in wild, superstitious nonsense for no good reason, then <b>what makes any religious believer so perfectly convinced in the absolute truth of their particular brand of faith?</b><br /><br />And so we come to the ultimate philosophical failure of all Christian apologetics: <b>The mere existence of other religions.</b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Notice how even if we completely grant everything that Christian apologists could ever ask for, we're still faced with an indisputably blunt fact about human nature: <b>the vast, overwhelming majority of all people throughout history have dedicated their lives to the worship of things that are most definitely not real.</b> We're talking about a phenomenon so ubiquitous among cultural groups that it practically qualifies as a defining feature. So it's not just atheists who are claiming that God does not exist, but the theists themselves with respect to each other. You will never find an orthodox Christian who sincerely believes that the Mormon conception of God can lead one to salvation, just like you will never find a single Mormon who accepts the salvation of Islam. If anything, the only practical distinction that separates theists from atheists is the simple fact that atheists add one extra little entry to that massive list of other God concepts that certainly aren't real.<br /><br />This is not a trivial observation to make, and it speaks volumes about the intellectual integrity of religious apologetics. If religion had anything to do a real, supernatural agent communicating His will onto our species, then you'd think we would see a gradual convergence of theologies over time. <b>False doctrines would inevitably have to be discarded as correct doctrines withstood critically objective scrutiny.</b> But instead, we see the exact opposite, with new religious denominations seemingly popping into existence all the time, then heavily segregating themselves along very distinct cultural and geographic boundaries [1]. It's a dead giveaway that religion has nothing to do with any rational desire to understand reality, but instead is a highly subjective product of human cultural groups. So rather than debate endlessly over the existence of any particular God or Gods, perhaps the real question we should be asking ourselves is <b>where do all these religions keep coming from in the first place?</b><br /><br />It cannot be stressed enough that this is still a perfectly valid question to ask<b> even if your own personal concept of God just so happens to be real.</b> Yet most Christian apologists are almost deafeningly silent on this question, as if the mere virtue of acknowledging it out loud would accidentally expose the gratuitous nature of their own beliefs. Even on the rare occasions when they do try to discuss the issue in some sense, the only comment they ever seem to have on the matter is a casual assertion of Christian <b>exclusivism</b>—the blanket insistence that all those other religions are just plain wrong while Christianity is obviously the only correct one out of the bunch [2,3].&nbsp; <br /><br />So if Christians aren’t even going to touch the problem of <b>religious pluralism</b> with a ten foot pole, then perhaps this is a good opportunity to see what science has to say on the matter. After all, <b>it’s not like all these religions just poofed into being out of nothing</b>. Something is obviously causing this phenomenon, and the only way to figure out what is through meticulous investigation. It was therefore only a matter of time before science finally stepped up to the plate by developing a viable, pragmatic theory of religion itself.<br /><br />Starting with the absolute basics, it’s important to always bear in mind that, from a purely biological perspective, human beings are essentially just another collection of evolved organisms. Everything about us is inescapably driven by a fundamental competition over scarce resources in an unending cycle of survival and reproduction. This is not a matter of any serious scientific dispute, but a brute fact of nature on which any religious theory must be grounded. Contrary to popular intuition, however, <b>not all competition is inherently zero sum</b>. That is to say, not all of my gains necessarily have to be a result of someone else’s loss. Life very frequently presents us with valuable opportunities to maximize fitness through simple acts of cooperation rather than pure, unrelenting antagonism. That's why so many organisms spend so much effort working together in cooperative groups. For example, wolves hunt together in packs, bees live together in colonies, and even the bacteria in your gut work with your own digestive track to break down complex nutrients.<br /><br />This is a well-known phenomenon called <b>symbiotic mutualism</b>, or simply <b>cooperation</b>, wherein self-interested biological agents tend to work together for the sake of mutually beneficial outcomes. It’s a perfectly natural consequence of basic game theory when applied to common biological scenarios. The only thing that distinguishes human beings in this regard is the sheer scale on which we've exploited its benefits. It's an advanced form of mutualism commonly referred to as <b>social interdependence</b>, wherein none of us can reliably survive and flourish without the rest of us. <b>The more we work together, the better off we collectively tend to be</b>. Cohesive, cooperative societies are therefore stable and prosperous, while fractured antagonistic societies inevitably struggle to meet basic human needs. <br /><br />None of this is controversial so far, but it does raise significant questions over how exactly our brains are able to manage all of this social navigation in the first place. For instance, consider this pair of objects shown here [imagine a rock and a face]. Obviously, one of these things is representative of a thinking, feeling agent, while the other is little more than a lifeless hulk of unfeeling material stuff. You may have noticed, however, that I didn’t really need to tell you any of that. If you're anything like most people, <b>you already came to that exact conclusion long before I even began explaining it.</b> Not only that, but you probably also have an innate sense of what this person might be feeling, or even where his attention is currently focused. <br /><br />Clearly, as this simple demonstration shows, human beings appear to possess highly effective faculties for both recognizing and evaluating the presence of other agents. It's all part of an awesome cognitive process known as <b>theory of mind</b>—the ability to perceive other objects in one’s environment as having a distinct mental awareness that is similar to, but independent of, the self. It's an essential tool in human social dynamics that allows us to empathize with fellow group members and even predict how they might respond to various situations. But as impressive as all this may be,<b> it's important to realize that it didn't all just happen by magic.</b> Somewhere, somehow, deep inside of your brain, there exist complex collections of neurons dedicated solely to this process. Some of these collections have even been identified directly, like the well-known system of mirror neurons found in most social primates. Not only do mirror neurons activate when an agent performs a given action, but also when the agent merely observes another agent performing the very same act [4].<br /><br />That's all well and good so far, but we need to always remember that evolution will never produce a perfectly reliable system. Mistakes are inevitably going to be made, and those mistakes necessarily must produce tangible, biological costs. To illustrate, simply imagine what might happen if you were utterly incapable of either recognizing or empathizing with other agents in your environment. That is to say, rather than perceive your fellow human beings as individuals with unique thoughts and motivations separate from your own, maybe you instead experience some lifeless, unfeeling stimulus, no different from the wind or sunshine. This is known as a <b>Type II error</b>, or simply a <b>false negative</b>—the failure to attribute agency onto an actual agent. So ask yourself, what biological costs might be associated with this kind error? How do you think people would react if you treated them as a mere stimulus rather than a fellow, sympathetic agent? Would that be <b><i>good </i></b>for your reproductive fitness, or <b><i>bad</i></b>? &nbsp; <br /><br />Obviously, the costs of such an error can be quite high, which is why natural selection has overwhelmingly biased our judgment as far away from this threshold as it possibly can. In so doing, however, we now fall under a much greater risk of committing the exact opposite mistake: the accidental attribution of subjective agency onto lifeless, unthinking objects. Such an error is called a <b>Type I error</b>, or a<b> false positive, </b>and again must result in tangible biological consequences.<br /><br />So no matter which way our actions are biased, it seems we cannot help but periodically make mistakes in our attribution of agency to the environment. Fortunately, however, <b>there is no reason whatsoever for the&nbsp; costs of such errors to be perfectly symmetric</b>. While a Type II error is essentially catastrophic for a socially dependent organism, the Type I error is merely inconvenient. Maybe you avoid stepping on a few bushes because you’re afraid to hurt them, or maybe you spend a little time asking the moon for advice. Maybe you perform a few rain dances to appease the clouds, or perhaps yell at the ocean for not producing enough fish. These are all perfectly affordable costs for any social creature, given the huge advantages that arise from trustworthy cooperation with other group members.&nbsp;&nbsp; <br /><br />This simple thought experiment represents the biological foundation for a very important phenomenon called <b>hyperactive agent detection—</b>the overwhelming tendency for human beings to over-attribute agency onto their environment rather than under-attribute. It's a ubiquitous aspect of all human psychology that can even be measured empirically under laboratory conditions. For example, <b>pareidolia </b>is the tendency to see things like human faces in otherwise random, natural features [5]. <b>Spontaneous social attribution</b> is a potent effect wherein animated geometric shapes are imbued with apparent personalities, relationships, genders, and back stories [6,7]. <b>Promiscuous teleology</b> is the tendency to perceive natural objects or random events as having been specially designed with intention [8]. <b>Personification </b>is a literary device wherein nonhuman objects, or even abstract objects, are endowed with distinctly human features and emotions [9]. Even <b>autism spectrum disorder</b> has been theorized as a kind of breakdown in these agent detection mechanisms, wherein victims characteristically struggle with basic social skills [10].<br /><br />So by default, without any need for outside priming or stimulation, the immediate human tendency is to perceive practically everything as if it were endowed with a distinct capacity for motivated agency. That's why, with all other factors being held equal, the spiritual beliefs of <u>all</u> primitive hunter-gatherer cultures have universally been <b>animistic </b>in nature. These so-called <b>primal religions</b> are strikingly similar in that mundane, lifeless objects, including rocks, trees, mountains and clouds, are all seen as having a distinctly spiritual essence that moves them and governs their behavior. It’s a perfectly natural manifestation given the constraints of early human cognition, but it’s a still completely wrong. <b>The weather does not respond to human promptings and the ocean isn’t going to produce any more fish no matter how much you yell at it</b>. Any effort spent placating the spirits is therefore inherently wasteful and must exert some tangible cost in terms of biological fitness.<br /><br />Notice how this puts early humans in a curious evolutionary position. While the benefits of social cooperation are comparatively enormous, the effort spent reacting to fictitious agents is still inherently costly. Natural selection therefore cannot help but operate on primal religious traditions by creating as many productive variations as it can. The immediate implication is thus a kind of <b>cultural descent with modification</b>, wherein religious practices slowly develop in sophistication and diversification over many successive generations. <b>It's as if religion itself literally takes on a life of its own by competing for adherents against other religions in a kind of cultural-psychological ecosystem.</b> Traditions that are more successful at generating converts and preserving their well-being will eventually come to dominate the cultural landscape, while less successful traditions are driven to ever greater obscurity, or even possible extinction.<br /><br />This is how animism gradually gave rise to a religious practice known as <b>polytheism—</b>the institutional worship of many gods and goddesses who serve as anthropomorphic representations for the various forces of nature. There's really no fundamental difference between the two systems, except for perhaps a relative degree of sophistication within the practicing cultures. For example, consider the famous gods and goddess of classical Greek and Roman mythology. What exactly is Poseidon, if not a glorified spirit of the sea and waves? What is Aphrodite, if not the spirit of love and fertility? Where did Zeus come from, if not the ever-watchful spirit of the sky and thunder? Even the various priests and oracles who worked at the great temples were little more than glorified shamans, taking on the distinct role of spiritual authority within local communities.<br /><br />Now consider what happens when the complexity of some polytheistic pantheon grows too large. That is to say, do we really have to appease <u><b>all</b></u> of the gods to produce favored outcomes? Or just some of the more important ones? Should I build a shrine to Zeus <b>and</b> Artemis? Or just Artemis alone? Do both gods even respond equally well to appeals? Or is one more sympathetic to human needs than the other?<br /><br /><b>Clearly, ancient polytheists could not possibly be expected to worship all gods with equal fervor. </b>Instead, practical limitations dictate that they eventually had to pick and choose among their favorites. It was a common religious practice known as <b>henotheism</b>, wherein many gods are openly acknowledged as both existing and exerting influence, but only a select few (or even just one) are ever granted any serious worship. For example, you don’t exactly see a whole lot of ancient Greek temples devoted to Atë, the goddess of mischief, but you do see a hell of a lot of time and energy spent on more prominent deities like Artemis, Zeus, and Athena [11]. Often times, this would manifest through a distinct system of local patronage wherein individual city-states tended to adopt a preferred deity for serious devotion. For example, Athens worshiped Athena, Olympia emphasized Zeus, and Corinth chose Poseidon. <br /><br />In some cases, the devotion towards one particular deity might grow so intense that all other deities would find themselves being excluded outright. It's a practice commonly known as <b>monolatrism</b> (or <b>monolatry</b>) wherein many gods are still openly acknowledged as existing, but only a single one is ever worshiped openly across some cultural region. For example, it's a well-known fact that the early Israelite nation believed in a whole slew of gods and goddesses, including such famous names as El, Ba'al, and Asherah [12]. The main difference, however, is that Yahweh, and only Yahweh, was ever granted any serious devotion. In fact, most Biblical scholars even agree that the Old Testament itself preserves many vestiges of that tradition in numerous passages. Take, for instance, the first of the Ten Commandments given to Moses: “thou shalt have no other gods before me” [13]. Notice that Yahweh doesn’t actually reject the existence of any other gods <i>per se</i>, but simply instructs Moses to never give any of them priority in worship. Many other passages further confirm this perspective, like in Exodus 15 which asks, "Who among the gods is like you, oh Lord?" [14]. What other gods could we possibly be talking about, if not the gods of some greater, established pantheon? <br /><br />Eventually, the practice of monolatry would grow so extreme for ancient Hebrews that they finally developed into full-on classical <b>monotheism</b>—the outright rejection of any existence whatsoever to all other gods but one. We again see evidence of this transition in later books of the Old Testament, which often go out of their way to remind the reader that there are no other gods but Yahweh [15]. Why would this be so important to emphasize if not to discredit a widely-held belief?<br /><br />It’s easy to see how the adoption of monotheism might lead to all kinds of distinct cultural advantages. After all, if there's only one God, and only one correct way to worship that God, then it becomes much easier to build a unified sense of cultural identity around that God. Doing so might have huge benefits for group cohesion on a national scale as well as the effectiveness of leadership authority. Maybe it provides greater resistance against hostile neighbors, or maybe better stability in national government. Who knows? But there obviously has to be some tangible benefit to this practice because the overwhelming majority of religious adherents today are most definitely monotheistic [16].<br /><br />Notice that we've just established a clear line of descent with modification that perfectly accounts for the historical development of all Western religion. Starting with early hunter-gatherer cultures, we know that hyperactive agent detection has full capacity to spontaneously develop into animism. Natural selection then acted that foundation over many generations to produce ever more complex and diverse variations. Some of those variants tended to anthropomorphize the numerous forces of nature, thereby giving rise to the familiar concept of gods and goddess. Practical necessity would then force those groups to prioritize worship among their favorite gods in particular, with some of those even going so far as to grant full devotion to only one, singular deity. At least one of those groups then came to reject the existence of all other spirit-gods entirely, such that one, and only one, god was finally given full authority over everything in the cosmos.<br /><br />Viola! Animism develops into polytheism, which turns into henotheism, which then grows into monolatrism, until finally culminating into monotheism. It perfectly explains the documented historical development of all known ancient religions. Not only that, but<b> it even predicts the branching tree-of-life pattern one would expect from a long chain of inherited descent with modification</b> [17]. So pray tell, my dear Christians, but what exactly do <b><u>you</u></b> think is going on here? Remember that your own faith requires you to be exclusive in terms of who can achieve salvation and who can't. That means every “wrong” branch in this tree, including those within Christianity itself, is necessarily doomed for all eternity.&nbsp;<b> Yet each and every one of these groups is equally convinced as you in the absolute truth of their faith. What makes you so god-damn confident that <u>your</u> particular little branch any better?</b><br /><br />Bear in mind now that, despite this huge wealth of anthropological data, there are still countless open questions that have yet to be resolved. For example, why do religions universally have such strong obsessions over human sexuality and death? Why do they consistently generate so many odd-ball stories about cosmology and human origins? What sort of forces tend to accelerate or stabilize the emergence of new religious traditions over time? What does it take to overcome these traditions and convince people to view the world through an objective, skeptical lens? These are all fantastic questions, and there’s a virtual army of psychologists, neurologists, historians, and anthropologists all collectively investigating them as we speak. Heck, maybe even some of you watching this right now will be instrumental in answering those questions within our lifetimes. Whatever the answers may be, they can only be found through the careful application of science and the scientific method. Only by understanding the cognitive forces that govern religious development can we ever hope to cure&nbsp; humanity of the superstitions that have plagued our minds since the dawn of civilization.<u><b> </b></u></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />----------------------------------------<br /><br /><u><b>Notes/References:</b></u></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><ol><u><b></b></u><li><a href="http://casualentropy.blogspot.com/2012/08/philosophical-failures-of-christian_27.html" target="_blank">Leading Church Bodies, 2000</a></li><li>See, for example, <a href="http://www.reasonablefaith.org/politically-incorrect-salvation" target="_blank">Politically Incorrect Salvation</a>, by William Lane Craig</li><li>See also Jones, M. S., <a href="http://digitalcommons.liberty.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1003&amp;context=phil_fac_pubs" target="_blank">The Problem of Religious Pluralism</a> </li><li>See <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mirror_neuron" target="_blank">Mirror Neurons</a></li><li><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pareidolia">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pareidolia</a></li><li>Heider and Simmel, "<a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/1416950?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents" target="_blank">An experimental study of apparent behavior</a>," <i>The American Journal of Psychology</i>, Vol 57, No 2, pp. 243-259 (1944)</li><li>Heider and Simmel Video: (<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sx7lBzHH7c8" target="_blank">link</a>)</li><li>..</li><li>...</li><li>Hamilton, A. F., "Reflecting on the mirror neuron system in autism: a systemic review of current theories," <i>Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience</i>, Vol. 3, pp 91-105, 2013</li><li>See the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Ancient_Greek_temples" target="_blank">List of Ancient Greek Temples</a> for an indication of which gods were more important over others.</li><li>Smith, M. S., <a href="https://www.amazon.com/dp/080283972X/" target="_blank">The Early History of God: Yahweh and the Other Deities of Ancient Israel</a>, </li><li>Exodus 20:3</li><li>Exodus 15:11</li><li>See Isaiah 45:5, Deuteronomy 4:35, Deuteronomy 32:39, 2 Samuel 7:22, 1 Kings 8:60, and many others</li><li>See the <a href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:World-religions.PNG" target="_blank">world religion breakdown</a>. Ignoring the non-religious, we find that almost two-thirds of the remainder are monotheists.</li><li>See the <a href="http://the40.org/world-religions-tree.html" target="_blank">World Religions Tree Infographic.</a> Or for a more simplified graphic, see <a href="http://d1luj6bq3j7ijk.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/85acb7827abdbd83b2580f173ee2e784.jpg" target="_blank">The Evolutionary Tree of Religion</a></li></ol></div>AnticitizenXhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05041380277822761284noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9068953745226541087.post-89326047609679186772017-07-29T16:35:00.004-07:002017-07-29T17:54:29.440-07:00 This is What a Typical Christian Rebuttal Looks Like<div style="text-align: justify;"><br />It looks like <a href="https://medium.com/the-liturgical-legion/in-defense-of-moral-argumentation-for-gods-existence-d8eae981aa79" target="_blank">I got a response</a> to my video presentation on the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DDi7_4BcvTg" target="_blank">Moral Argument for the Existence of God</a>. It comes from a guy who calls himself <i>Maximus Confesses</i> and represents one of the higher-quality examples of feedback I've received on my videos. Unfortunately, that's not really saying much, since practically everything this guy says is just wrong. However, I'm going to do a public analysis anyway, just to give you all a taste of the bizarre philosophical nonsense I have to put up with from Christians. Let’s take a look!<br /><br />For convenience, I have placed Maximus' quotes in bold-italics. Whenever he cites my own writings, I also underline them. <br /><br /><b><i>My capacity to respond to videos is often halted by my inability to watch and rewatch videos, while typing up a transcript. However, I am fortunate that the YouTube user AntiCitizen X (henceforth ACX) decided to publish a transcript of his video on his blog.&nbsp;&nbsp; </i></b><br /><br />You’re welcome.<br /><br /><b><i>Before I begin, I want to draw a distinction between the moral argument as I’ve often come across it online, as opposed to Moral Argumentation for God’s existence in general. The formulation that people like ACX and I are acquainted with is the formulation provided by William Lane Craig, which is,</i></b></div><ol><li><b><i>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; If God does not exist, objective moral values and duties do not exist.</i></b></li><li><b><i>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Objective moral values and duties do exist.</i></b></li><li><b><i>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Therefore, God exists.</i></b></li></ol><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><i>However, this is not the only formulation of the argument, I provide my own here. So, even if one does have reason to object to the validity of this formulation, it does not rule out other formulations of the moral argument.</i></b><br /><br />I was actually quite clear in my presentation that there are “dozens of variations floating around” with respect to the moral argument for God’s existence. However, it is important to realize that I actually made very little effort to attack the formal structure of the argument itself. Instead, the overwhelming majority of my criticism was levied at the ideas required to state the argument in the first place. Those fundamental ideas, including divine command theory, moral realism, and moral objectivity, are almost universal across the entirety of Christian moral philosophy. So yes, Maximus, any criticism I offer against Craig’s version of the moral argument does indeed transfer quite happily to all other variations you could possibly hope to offer. Unless you hold to a fundamental conception of morality that wildly differs from the overwhelming majority of mainstream Christianity, then this comment of yours is completely false. <br /><br /><i><b>With that point out of the way, I will begin by first addressing the greatest flaw of my interlocutor’s post, namely, that it is composed of a slew of irrelevant observations. Take for example the following, </b><br /><b><br /><u>Religions work very hard to intertwine themselves with the perception of absolute moral authority, such that giving up one’s faith is often seen as the equivalent of giving up all sense of human decency at the same time. Why else would believers consistently view atheists as the least trustworthy minority group in all of America [3]? It’s another deliberate psychological ploy designed to manipulate the believers into remaining believers, and not necessarily to build a viable case for God’s existence. </u></b></i><br /><br />Maximus doesn’t seem to appreciate the basic, running theme of my videos. It’s not enough to merely refute some random philosophical argument. I like to present some of the relevant psychology that compels people to embrace bad arguments in the first place. I also like to present big picture information as to why such an argument is actually worth responding to, given the huge variety of nonsensical claims that we could be spending out time on. To that effect, <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22059841" target="_blank">I cited a study</a> wherein atheists actually ranked lower than <i><b>rapists </b></i>on a perceived measure of distrust. I did this specifically to emphasize the broader social impact of this subject, yet Maximus is summarily dismissing the whole thing outright as “irrelevant observations”---as if such information couldn’t possibly inform the discussion in any capacity whatsoever!<br /><br />Good grief, it’s called “context,” you moron. It’s what good writers do to invite their audience into the discussion. You don’t just dive head-first into nuanced philosophical essays without first introducing the topic a little. That would be boring. Your comments on this matter are completely pointless, except to take a cheap shot at my character. <br /><br /><b><i>First off, let’s disentangle what the word ‘religion’ from the context of the moral argument.</i>&nbsp;</b><br /><br />Dude, it’s called “The Moral Argument for the Existence of God.” In what logical universe are we supposed to disentangle religion from a literal argument for God’s existence?&nbsp; <br /><b><br /></b><b><i>The main thrust of moral argumentation for the existence of God is that the truth of objective morality requires the existence of God. One need not be religious to believe in God, so, as far as I’m concerned, this is mere virtue signaling to other atheists that they’re special snowflakes, freed from the psychological ploys of the religious. </i></b><br /><br />So the fact that atheists are considered less trustworthy than literal <i><b>rapists </b></i>is an entirely irrelevant point in your mind? Do you really fail to see how this little piece of information might have some relevance to the way people respond to the moral argument? Come on, Maximus. You can’t possibly be that dense. <br /><br /><b><i>Here’s is another one, </i><i><br /><br /><u>But even ignoring all of that, the one thing that makes this argument such a truly spectacular failure is the fact that Christians are specifically trying to prove the existence of Yahweh, the God of the Bible — the very same god that has openly and proudly endorsed some of the most unspeakable moral atrocities we can possibly imagine. We’re talking about a God that actively encourages:<br /><br />1. Slavery (Exodus 21:20–21, Colossians 3:22, Ephesians 6:5)<br /><br />2. Blood sacrifice (Genesis 8:20)<br /><br />3. Human sacrifice (Genesis 22:1–18, Exodus 32:27)<br /><br />4. Misogyny (Genesis 3:16, Exodus 21:7–8, Corinthians 11:8–9)<br /><br />5. Genital Mutilation (Genesis 17:10–14, 1 Samuel 18:27)<br /><br />6. Genocide (Genesis 6–9, Numbers 21:3, Numbers 21:33–35, Deuteronomy 2:33–34, Joshua 6:21–27, Joshua 10)<br /><br />7. Infanticide (1 Samuel 15:3, Exodus 11–12)<br /><br />8. Thought crimes (Matthew 5:27–28)<br /><br />9.Rape (Deuteronomy 22:28–29)<br /><br />10. and death penalties for trivial offences! (Exodus 35:2, Numbers, 15:32–36, 2 Samuel 6:6–7, 1 Kings 13:15–24, 2 kings 2:23) <br /><br />The very idea that the Biblical God is supposed to serve as the ultimate standard of moral goodness is patently ludicrous. It practically gives a free-license to engage in the most destructive, antisocial behaviors in human history.</u></i></b><br /><br /><b><i>Again, irrelevant. Moral argumentation need not be used for the God of Christianity. Even if it were, the Christian need not commit themselves to Biblical inerrancy. Further, even Christians who do accept inerrancy, there is still an apologetic offered (for example, my own defense of Biblical slavery). Sometimes, the apologetic is as simple as pointing out that one’s interlocutor is too stupid to read. </i></b><br /><br />What a wonderful tool of argumentation. Simply dismiss a monumental observation as merely “irrelevant” and don’t even bother addressing the key point at hand.<br /><br />Look Maximus, this is really simple. If you are Christian, then it stands to reason that you worship the deity known as Yahweh. If you are also a supporter of the Moral Argument for God’s existence, then it necessarily follows that everything you believe about the relationship between God and morality must also apply to that very same Yahweh character described in the Holy Bible. If you actually bothered to read your Bible, you would further find several records of Yahweh happily endorsing all kinds of horrible things like slavery, genocide, and rape. Therefore, if you believe Yahweh is the standard for all moral perfection and goodness, then you are also implicitly arguing for the moral goodness of slavery, genocide, and rape! If you cannot wrap your little brain around the fatal problems this might present for your entire moral philosophy, then you’re quite literally too stupid to be involved in this conversation. <br /><br /><b><i>For example, Matthew 5:27–28 reads,<br /><br />“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’28 But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart. <br /><br />However, since a thoughtcrime is an Orwellian neologism used to describe an illegal thought, and nowhere is Jesus proscribing some form of punishment, it does not fit the category. Granted, Jesus does suggest that it’s sinful, but to be sinful is not necessarily to incur some punishment. </i></b><br /><br />Let me get this straight. Jesus states flat-out that lust is a sin of the same magnitude as adultery. However, since Jesus didn’t explicitly prescribe a punishment for that particular act, that somehow makes it all okay? As if I can lust after women all day long and God will not hold a single one of those sins against me in the afterlife? Do you even know what you’re saying? And how does any this comment even come close to addressing the issue at hand?<br /><br /><b><i>Jesus also says<br /><br />“Why then,” they asked, “did Moses command that a man give his wife a certificate of divorce and send her away?” Jesus replied, “Moses permitted you to divorce your wives because your hearts were hard. But it was not this way from the beginning. I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another woman commits adultery.” <br /><br />Notice, Jesus says divorce is and was sinful, but permitted (and hence, did not incur punishment) under the law of Moses. It’s quick observations like these that expose such lists as less daunting than they appear. I could go on, but I’d like to go to the meat of the argument. </i></b><br /><br />First off, Jesus never says that divorce is permissible in any objectivist sense of the word. He simply says that “Moses permitted” divorce for various reasons. So your comment doesn’t even jibe with the quoted facts of the Bible as you just barely stated.<br /><br />Secondly, Jesus also goes on to say that divorce is still sinful except for very specific conditions. It is therefore a complete mystery to me what Maximus is even trying to argue with this point. If the Bible does not explicitly prescribe some direct punishment for a given sin, is that supposed to automatically mean everyone is free to engage in such behavior without any consequences whatsoever? Where is he even going with this? This entire comment from Maximums is just a giant non-sequitur. <br /><br /><b><i>The first objection is that,</i></b><br /><br /><i><u><b>But what is morality, really? Because for all this talk about morals and values, it’s surprisingly rare for anyone to actually break them down into rigorous, coherent terms. So let’s begin with the simple observation that the core of all morality is implicitly defined by choice. That’s why we only tend to punish people for things they consciously decide to do or not do, and never for things that just happen. But it’s also equally important to realize that choice itself has no practical meaning unless one is trying to actualize some desirable outcome. “Good” and “right” choices are those which can reliably produce a specified result, while “bad” and “wrong” choices ultimately fail in that goal. </b></u><br /><b><br />I agree that morality first has to be defined, and I think morality necessarily concerns the choices of agents. However, the notion that “choice itself has no practical meaning unless one is trying to actualize some desirable outcome” is contentious. </b></i><br /><br />So you agree that morality is implicitly defined by choice, but you dispute the idea that choice has any logical connection to actions and consequences. Okay, fine. Name me a single example of a choice that is morally good, in and of itself, independent of any goals or consequences. Go. <br /><br /><b><i>Some things should be recognized as a good in themselves. Take for example reason itself, it could not be solely valuable because if its practical outcome because knowing any practical outcomes presupposes the value of reason in the first place. </i></b><br /><br />First off, you don't have to "presuppose the value of reason" in order to observe that reason tends to help actualize desirable, pro-social outcomes by properly informing social decisions. That's just a completely false proposition on the part of Maximus.<br /><br />Secondly, it's important to point out that Maximus hasn’t actually bothered to define morality yet, and already he is making bare assertions that certain things are just good. How does he pretend to know that? What does goodness even mean? What rules does he apply when assigning that label? What is it about reason that makes it a good thing and not a bad thing? Maximus haven’t even bothered to address these questions in the slightest shred of detail, but instead just asserts his position outright (something he is ironically about to accuse me of doing very shortly!). <br /><br />As far as I can tell, Maximus seems to think that goodness is just some inherent metaphysical quality of reason itself. So even if, by some happenstance, reason were to result in the consistent propagation of pain and suffering on a global scale, that aura of goodness would still surround every act of reason anyway. It's very frustrating to have to respond to this kind of criticism, given that my video already explains these exact problems in painstaking detail. All Maximus is doing is reasserting the very thing I went out of my way to debunk. <br /><br /><b><i>It is from this point where ACX sneaks in consequentialism, </i></b><br /><br />How it is sneaky to state openly and proudly that consequentialism is a logically necessary component of all coherent morality? For fuck’s sake, Maximus, I even wrote the word “consequentialism” in giant orange letters on the screen! In what possible context is that being “sneaky?” Morality implies choice, choice implies goals, and goals imply actions and consequences. This is not a subtle train of thought, you jackass. <br /><br />I apologize in advance for my growing impatience and profanity, but Maximus is being completely disingenuous with his choice of words here. I have no patience for people who have to deliberately lie so brazenly when engaging in basic philosophical discussions. <br /><br /><u><i><b>So which goals are specifically “moral” in nature and which ones are not? This is another one of those sticky philosophical issues that sparks all kinds of academic debate to this day. Yet despite all the contention, most people do tend to agree that any coherent concept of seemingly “moral” behavior must revolve around some kind of ultimate, social interaction. Morally “good” choices tend to manifest through desirable, pro-social consequences while morally “evil” choices are those which tend to do the opposite. But no matter what the specifics may be, it’s important to always bear in mind that the whole notion of morality itself is utterly meaningless and irrelevant without some form of consequentialism at its foundation. </b></i></u><br /><br /><b><i>And just like that, with no argument made, another assertion is just thrown out there, and ACX just expects us to swallow it whole. </i></b><br /><br />Maximus doesn’t seem to realize that all I’m doing here is stating a definition. I am simply explaining what the word “morality” seems to entail as a basic concept within the English language. I therefore don’t need any heavy-handed arguments to support my position, because all definitions are little more than “bare assertions” at the end of the day. All I have to do is show how my definition is more coherent and functional than the alternatives, which I spend a great deal of effort on in the following paragraphs. Not only that, but Maximus spends a great deal of his essay responding to those very paragraphs, which means on some fundamental level he has to know that I’m not just throwing shit out there and expecting you to swallow it. This whole comment is therefore yet another example of Maximus’ deliberate dishonesty. <br /><br /><b><i>It’s as if virtue ethics or deontology aren’t viable eithical frameworks. </i></b><br /><br />During my video, I went out of my way to compare and contrast consequentialism against the standard Christian perspectives on morality. I elaborated in great detail how consequentialism provides simple, intuitive interpretations for various propositions, while Christian moral realism simply collapses under its own incoherence. Again, Maximus knows this because he spends a huge chunk of his essay engaging with those very arguments. This comment is therefore yet another lie, in that he acts as if I’ve casually disregarded such views without a second thought. <br /><br /><b><i>However, let’s agree with ACX, could not a Christian be a consequentialist? </i></b><br /><br />In principle, yes. But the overwhelming majority of Christians adhere to divine command theory (DCT), which is logically incompatible with consequentialism. This isn’t just my opinion, either, but the general consensus of practically every Christian philosopher I’ve ever talked to, listened to, or read about. Christians are the ones who will go out of their way to reject consequentialist viewpoints as “moral relativism” and therefore unfit for Christian moral philosophy. Therefore, no, if you are anything like most Christians, you cannot be both.<br /><br /><b><i>&nbsp;If God’s will determines right and wrong, then what has greater consequence than heaven and hell? </i></b><br /><br />This is a point I actually went out of my way to belabor during later sections of the video, so it’s kind of weird that Maximus decided to bring it up. It’s as if he either didn’t watch the video all the way through, or he honestly doesn’t understand the implications of what he is suggesting.<br /><br />As I already said in my video, the concepts of heaven and hell only make sense when viewed through the perspective of a self-interested, consequentialist morality. If you desire heaven, and if there are certain actions that will get you there, then it is a "good" decision to engage in those actions. Such behaviors are the “right” things to do and you “ought” to do them. Under DCT, however, heaven and hell are irrelevant. God gives us commands, and we simply ought to follow those commands irrespective of whatever personal gains they may produce. DCT is therefore logically incompatible with consequentialism, and obviously so. <br /><br />The problem for Christians is that divine punishment for our sins is a core doctrine of all Christian religion. That means the very nature of Christian theology strongly urges you to adopt a consequentialist view on morality. After all, if “evil” decisions were guaranteed to produce admission into paradise, what possible reason could you give me to engage in “good” behaviors? No matter what arguments you have to offer, I can immediately destroy them with a casual statement of “Fuck your morality.” I want to go to paradise. Now what? It’s as if Maximus hasn’t even thought about the catastrophic implications of the very argument he’s just presented.<br /><br />The final problem with this whole line of reasoning is that the statement "God's will determines right and wrong" is simply question-begging. Remember that the whole point of the Moral Argument is to prove God's existence in the first place. That means you can't claim the existence of objective morals and values without first proving the existence of God. Yet the existence of objective morals and values is already a necessary premise in the argument that proves God's existence!<br /><br />HELLOOOOO? Earth to Maximus? That's circular logic, you dumb ass!<br /><br /><b><i>If this makes God a moral monster, with no virtue, then I have to ask why isn’t ACX a virtue theorist who thinks that it’s manifesting proper character in an agent which makes something ‘right’ or ‘wrong’? </i></b><br /><br />I’m not a virtue theorist because I’m a consequentialist. I was nothing but clear and open about this from the very beginning. Consequentialism is meaningful and functional. Virtue theory is not. I don’t have to be a virtue theorist in order to claim “Person X is evil.” If God’s commands are not conducive to a productive, safe, healthy, flourishing society, then God’s commands are “evil.” This isn’t hard to grasp. Just because words mean different things to me as they do to you, that does not forbid me from using them in sentences. <br /><br /><u><b><i>Strangely enough, however, most Christian philosophers actually reject this principle outright, claiming instead that morality is an objective feature of the universe itself, like the law of gravity or the charge of an electron; that even if the entire human race went extinct today, then certain laws of morality would still be absolutely true and universally binding on all sentient beings across the cosmos. </i></b></u><br /><b><i><br />It’s at this point that ACX slips from normative ethics and into meta-ethics. For those who don’t know, meta-ethics concern the nature of ethics (what does it mean to say X is right or wrong), and normative ethics concern methods of figuring out what is right and wrong. </i></b><br /><br />No, I’m contrasting the consequentialist view of morality against the moral realist view as described by standard Christian philosophy. This comment is also somewhat weird, in that Maximus is basically accusing me of “slipping” into something that I was doing very deliberately. Not only that, but even if we accept his accusation at face value, Maximus seems to be under the bizarre impression that transitioning from a discussion on normative ethics into meta-ethics is somehow a bad thing---as if those two topics have literally nothing to do with each other and don’t ever belong in the same essay. This comment is yet another pointless jab at my character for no good reason. <br /><i><br /><b>Consequentialism is a normative theory, and while one can be a moral anti-realist and a consequentialist, it is not necessary. G.E. Moore is one such example of a realist, and a consequentialist. </b></i><br /><br />First off, just because some famous guy held to a particular view, that does not automatically prove the view to be logically consistent or coherent. Maximus is just appealing to authority like a brainless idiot.<br /><br />Secondly, if Maximus were half as educated on this stuff as he claims to be, he would know that there is no single, unifying school of moral realism in the world of philosophy. All I can say is that, in this context, I am specifically addressing the dominant Christian perspectives on moral realism, and that such perspectives are most definitely incompatible with consequentialism.<b><i>&nbsp;</i></b><br /><br /><b><i>ACX then proceeds to attack moral realism, but is fully unconvincing. </i></b><br /><br /><u><i><b>It’s another one of those tempting philosophical views called moral realism, and while it may appeal to certain naive intuitions, it utterly fails before it even begins. Because to say that anything is morally “good” or “evil,” in and of itself, without any reference to goals or consequences, is just incoherent gibberish. For example, just stop ask yourself: what on Earth is an objective moral value supposed to look like? Like if some guy were to say to you that, “human life has objective value,” or that “human life is objectively good,” what does that even mean? </b></i></u><br /><br /><b><i>Again, the realist can be a consequentialist, so this does not preclude moral realism from being true, even if ACX’s assertion regarding the necessity of consequentialism was the case. ACX also provides us little reason to think that saying something is good in itself is gibberish. The only argument is that it isn’t susceptible to our senses. But so what? ACX has not given us any argument which commits us to empiricism. Asking what an “objective moral value supposed to look like” makes little more sense than asking what does green taste like, or what does sour look like. </i></b><br /><br />I issued you a challenge, Maximus: explain to me the meaning of the phrase “Human life is objectively good.” This has nothing to do with empiricism and nothing to do with susceptibility to our sense. Those are all red herrings and you know it. Stop beating around the bush and explain to everyone what the fuck that expression means. Every interpretation of that sentence I can possibly think of is gibberish nonsense---all <b>except</b> the interpretation given by a consequentialist perspective. <br /><br /><b><i>It’s little more than a category error. Objective values are picked up by our moral intuitions. </i></b><br /><br />Wait, what? Did you just say <i><u><b>moral intuitions</b></u></i>? Do you mean to tell me that every time you assign labels like “good” and “evil,” you’re doing so entirely by gut-feeling? This guy is actually trying to tell me that the proposition “human life is objectively good” is only true because his moral intuition says so! <br /><br />Okay, seriously, if this is the road you want to go down, then you might as well just raise the white flag of philosophical surrender right now. You’ve just lost the argument via sheer force of your own idiocy. I should not have to explain to you why this is a terrible foundation for any moral philosophy. <br /><br /><b><i>That is human beings have a cognitive predisposition to believe in the rightness or wrongness of some action. Can these intuitions be wrong, or even naive. Sure they can, but so can our senses (for example, most solid objects are made of empty space, a fact which our senses speak to the contrary). However, this doesn’t entail we abandon our senses, and deny the existence of the external world.</i>&nbsp;</b><br /><br />Okay, just stop. When your entire argument starts revolving around “cognitive predispositions” and “moral intuitions,” then it’s safe to say you have no clue what you’re talking about. You’re basically grounding your entire sense of moral philosophy on the subjective intensity of warm fuzzies you get whenever someone behaves nicely or meanly around you. How on Earth that little tingling sensation is supposed to lead us to “therefore, god exists,” is completely beyond me. <br /><br />The thing that’s really bizarre about this comment is how Maximus went out of his way to bash on empiricism as a viable path for understanding morality. Now here he is, grounding his entire argument in pure sense perception of some mystical moral essence surrounding human actions. That’s an <u><i><b>empirical argument</b></i></u>, you idiot. What’s worse about this line of thinking is that it forces us back into the same conundrums I mentioned earlier. If human beings possess some kind of innate moral sense that allows to perceive goodness, then what physical mechanisms govern that perception? Light carries information to our eyeballs, pressure waves in air carry sound to our ears, and chemical reception carries information about scent to our noses. If Maximus is right about this, then in principle I ought to be able to artificially replicate that perception in some kind of moral thermometer. Yet Maximus himself has already rejected that possibility outright in his earlier comments!<br /><br />I’m sorry, Maximus, but this is just asinine. We’re barely halfway through your essay, and you have yet to offer a single point of criticism that contained any merit whatsoever. You contradict yourself constantly, you take embarrassingly clumsy jabs at my character and competence, you make constant non sequitur arguments, and you have yet to even attempt a coherent definition of morality that might compete with consequentialist views. I don’t have the patience to slog through such amateurish nonsense anymore. Come back when you can write a criticism that isn't childish and stupid.<br /><br /><br /></div>AnticitizenXhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05041380277822761284noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9068953745226541087.post-19847145896606914102017-02-10T17:57:00.000-08:002017-02-13T16:20:52.621-08:00Some Facts About the New Testament<div style="text-align: justify;"><br />The next time anyone tries to tell you that the New Testament is historically reliable, try to remember the following facts:</div><ol style="text-align: justify;"><li>The authors of the four canonical gospels are completely anonymous. </li><li>All four canonical gospels are translated works.</li><li>There does not exist a single first-hand eyewitness account of anything Jesus ever did.</li><li>All four canonical gospels were written decades after the fact.</li><li>The earliest surviving fragments of the New Testament were all written at least a century after the recorded events.</li><li>The four canonical gospels are NOT independent narratives, but actually borrow heavily from each other. </li><li>The story of Jesus and the adulteress is almost certainly a forgery.</li><li>Miracle stories were commonplace in the ancient world and often garnered large followings of worshipers and devotees.</li><li>The further back in time we go, the more divergence there exists between the known manuscripts that have survived for scrutiny to modern times.&nbsp;&nbsp;</li><li>Six out of the fourteen Pauline epistles are widely considered forgeries by modern Biblical scholars.</li><li>Early Christianity consisted of many competing denominations with many competing gospels that never made it into the official Biblical cannon.</li></ol><div style="text-align: justify;">More to come...<br /><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Notes:</div><ol style="text-align: justify;"><li style="text-align: justify;">See <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u72myyXDA74&amp;t=22m40s" target="_blank">Yale Courses</a></li><li style="text-align: justify;">The native language of ancient Judea was Aramaic. However, all known manuscripts of the gospels are written in Greek.</li><li style="text-align: justify;">The mere fact that they've been translated is already a strong indication of this. However, many of the narratives admit it outright. For example, Luke 1:1-4 and Galatians 1:11-12. We can also point out that Jesus never wrote down a single word of any gospel by himself.</li><li style="text-align: justify;">See <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dating_the_Bible" target="_blank">Dating the Bible.</a></li><li style="text-align: justify;">See <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dating_the_Bible" target="_blank">Dating the Bible.</a></li><li style="text-align: justify;">This is known as the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synoptic_Gospels" target="_blank">synoptic problem</a>. Many sections of the gospel are near-verbatim copies of sections from other books. See, for example, Mark 10:38-45. Then compare side-by-side with Matthew 20:22:28.&nbsp;</li><li style="text-align: justify;">See <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesus_and_the_woman_taken_in_adultery" target="_blank">Jesus and the Woman Taken in Adultery.</a></li><li style="text-align: justify;">See <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollonius_of_Tyana" target="_blank">Appolonius of Tyana.</a>&nbsp;</li><li style="text-align: justify;">See <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Misquoting-Jesus-Story-Behind-Changed/dp/0060859512/" target="_blank">Misquoting Jesus.</a></li><li style="text-align: justify;">See <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Authorship_of_the_Pauline_epistles" target="_blank">Authorship of the Pauline Epistles&nbsp;</a></li><li style="text-align: justify;">See <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diversity_in_early_Christian_theology" target="_blank">Diversity in Early Christianity. </a>See also <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gospel#Non-canonical_gospels" target="_blank">Non-canonical Gospels</a> </li></ol>AnticitizenXhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05041380277822761284noreply@blogger.com18tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9068953745226541087.post-82042869777692030532017-01-01T12:05:00.000-08:002017-07-11T08:56:24.848-07:00Evolutionary Absurdity Against Naturalism<div style="text-align: justify;"><br />Apparently, there’s a lot of popular Christian apologists who think that if evolution is real, then naturalism is not. Or something. It’s actually kind of hard to tell because the argument itself is kind of weird. But let’s see if our good friend Inspiring Philosophy can explain (<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vpQ1-AGPysM" target="_blank">link</a>)</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /><b>[00:05] “When we hear of some new attempt to explain reasoning… naturalistically, we ought to react as if we were told that someone had squared the circle.” - Peter Geach</b><br /><br />One of the most aggravating things about apologists like Inspiring Philosophy is how they can’t go more than 10 seconds without saying something incredibly dumb. For example, take this quote here. The only logical way this statement could ever be true is if the idea of naturalism somehow contradicted the idea of reason. That literally, the very proposition “Reason is a natural phenomenon” must entail some kind of logical impossibility like married bachelors or square circles. However, that cannot possibly be the case unless the definition of reason already presupposes an inherently supernatural process. So the argument hasn’t even officially begun yet and this dumb bastard is already begging the question. He is effectively declaring, in advance, that he has categorically rejected the very possibility of a natural explanation for human reason.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>[00:14] “One of the age-old problems in philosophy is the problem of skepticism. How can we be certain what we experience and know is true and not an illusion or just a useful model? How do we know our knowledge is accurate and not a trick that external forces are making us believe?”</b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />This is another one of those little things about religious apologists that always gets under my skin. What he’s saying here about skepticism isn’t exactly wrong <i>per se</i>, but it is being expressed in a lazy, incompetent way. For example, what does it mean for an experience to be true? Because last time I checked, truth was a property of propositions, not experiences. Trying to ask whether or not an experience is true is like trying to ask whether or not my music is colorful. It might loosely mean something to some people in some figurative context, but from a purely technical standpoint, it’s just meaningless gibberish. What he’s actually trying to ask is how we can be certain that our experiences are representative of a real, objective reality, as opposed to, say, some illusion like a matrix simulation. That is the fundamental problem of skepticism, and it’s a perfectly valid thing to be concerned about when studying epistemology. It’s just kind of hard to address such problems when you’re terrible at expressing them in the first place.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>[00:30] “The usual way this is addressed is through the position of epistemic particularism, which is basically the position that our knowledge is innocent until proven guilty. There is no reason to doubt our knowledge, beliefs, and intuition unless we can find an actual reason to cause us to doubt.”</b><br /><br />See what I mean? Read that back again. <i>There is no reason to doubt our beliefs, unless we can find an actual reason to doubt our beliefs.</i> Thank you so much for that brilliant insight!<br /><br />Vapid tautologies aside, where exactly does IP get the idea that this is the “usual” way to address the problem of skepticism? He makes it out as if philosophers everywhere are just casually ignoring the problem altogether. The reality, of course, is that nothing could be further from the truth. Ever since the days of Rene Descartes, philosophers have all had perfectly good reasons to be quite concerned about the objectivity of sense data. That’s why every philosophical reference worth its weight in salt will openly acknowledge skepticism as a very serious problem to be dealt with.<br /><br />And speaking of “epistemic particularism,” I actually had to look this term up because I never even heard of it until I watched this video. It’s a really obscure term that only gets thrown around in the odd paper or two, but doesn't represent a popular view held by any significant people. Not only that, but the definition doesn't even match what IP just said. According to his very own citation:<br /><br /><i>“... epistemological particularism is the view that there are some particular items of knowledge (or justifiable belief) that one can know (justifiably believe) without knowing how one knows them.”&nbsp;</i><br />- J.P. Moreland<br /><br />That is not the same thing as “innocent until proven guilty.” It's as if IP is either deliberately making things up out of thin air, or he really is just that incompetent at reading comprehension.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>[00:45] “What if there was a reason that could cause us to begin to doubt our beliefs? What if our beliefs led to an internal contradiction and a self-defeating circle?”</b>&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />We already have a reason to doubt our beliefs. It’s called skepticism. You just mentioned it 30 seconds ago. This is a well-documented problem that demonstrably manifests itself in our daily lives. We dream; we hallucinate; we misremember; we experience illusions; we have limited, fallible, subjective perspective about the external, mind-independent reality. We therefore cannot “know” any of it with absolute, perfect certainty. This is a cornerstone of all modern epistemology and philosophy of science. The train has left the station centuries ago, yet IP is here pretending like it’s still just sitting there on idle.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>[01:00] “If you hold to philosophical naturalism, then that is in fact the case. Philosophical and evolutionary naturalism would be the belief that there are no supernatural entities; the natural world is all of existence, and humans came about by accident through the blind workings of matter.”</b><br /><br />Does Inspiring Philosophy think that we’re all idiots or something? He just displayed the encyclopedia definition of naturalism on his own video and then proceeded to read out a completely different definition. That’s the second time he’s done this in less than a minute of speaking! So let’s read IP’s very own citation for him, shall we?<i>&nbsp;</i><br /><br /><i>Naturalism is an approach to philosophical problems that interprets them as tractable through the methods of the empirical sciences, or at least without a distinctively a priori project of theorizing. For much of the history of philosophy it has been widely held that philosophy involved a distinctive method, and could achieve knowledge distinct from that attained by the special sciences. Thus, metaphysics and epistemology have often jointly occupied a position of "first philosophy," laying the necessary grounds for the understanding of reality and the justification of knowledge claims. Naturalism rejects philosophy's claim to that special status. Whether in epistemology, ethics, philosophy of mind, philosophy of language, or other areas, naturalism seeks to show that philosophical problems, as traditionally conceived, are ill-formulated and can be solved or displaced by appropriately naturalistic methods. Naturalism often assigns a key role to the methods and results of the empirical sciences, and sometimes aspires to reductionism and physicalism. However, there are many versions of naturalism and some are explicitly non-scientistic. What they share is a repudiation of the view of philosophy as exclusively a priori theorizing concerned with a distinctively philosophical set of questions.</i></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />– Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy<br /><br />So there you have it. Naturalism is not a particular set of beliefs about the universe, but really more of a <b>methodology </b>for evaluating philosophical problems. More often than not, that methodology is specifically understood to follow the rules of empirical sciences, which is honestly the real target of this whole discussion anyway. Notice, however, that naturalism does not explicitly reject the existence of supernatural entities, nor does it commit you to any particular views about human development. Those are simply consequences of applied naturalism, but not central tenets of it.<br /><br />It’s important to realize that anything which exists and interacts with other existing things must, by definition, have a <b>nature</b>---a collection of essential identifiable properties and causal relationships with respect to other things. We can formally state these properties through purely analytic methods, but any claim to their existence can only be justified through the use of empirical data. Supernatural entities, in contrast, are philosophically meaningless to even talk about. How do I identify an entity that, by definition, is “above” any need for essential properties? How do I prove that such a thing exists when, by definition, such things fail to behave in accordance with any causally predictive patterns? Naturalists don’t reject the existence of supernatural entities through some rote, <i>a priori</i> conviction; they reject them because the idea itself is incomprehensible!<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>[01:14] “We would have evolved by accident from the lower animals by passing on traits and beliefs that help us survive.”</b>&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: justify;">&nbsp; </div><div style="text-align: justify;">No, that is NOT an intrinsic view of naturalism. That is a sloppily-worded summary of human evolutionary biology, as understood by the contingent findings of naturalistic methodologies. And even then, you still managed to get key aspects completely wrong. Beliefs are not “passed on” from one generation to the next, because beliefs are not inheritable traits. Only genes can do that.<br /><br /><b>[01:14] “Everything that makes us who we are would have come together via natural selection to aid us in surviving. However, that would include everything about us, which includes the chemistry of the brain and how it functions. The human-evolved brain would only have come about as a means to aid an organism in surviving."</b><br /><br />Nowhere did Dennett ever imply that literally everything which makes you “you” is determined entirely by genetics and natural selection. He is just talking about the natural development of human brains and explaining how your mind is simply a product of that brain in action. However, there is also a lot to be said about the importance of environmental circumstance and personal experience as potent factors towards building a coherent sense of self-identity. It’s not just evolution and nothing else.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>[02:04] “So if naturalism is true, everything the brain does is for survival, which must necessarily include all the beliefs and thoughts it has; which would entail the fact that all the beliefs we think are true of reality were really just formed in the brain to help us survive. But consequently, this would also include the belief in naturalism. So if you believe naturalism is true, then you also have to believe you believe naturalism is true because your brain has decided this belief is beneficial for survival. Not because it is true.”</b><br /><br />So yes, IP really believes that, according to naturalism, everything about your mind is the product of pure, natural selection alone. There is no room for personal experience or environmental conditions, and everything must unilaterally facilitate survival, or else.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />First off, nothing about philosophical naturalism requires you to hold any position for or against evolution. It is only by applying the naturalistic methods of science that one arrives at the strong indication of an evolutionary history behind human development. Since that development already encompasses everything from basic morphology to fundamental biochemistry, why not also include cognitive capacity as well? We know that physical brains are specifically responsible for our memory, sense processing, behavioral responses, and language, so why not also our faculties for higher reasoning? Nothing about this presumption is inherently troubling, unless one has already decided, in advance, that human reason is literally the product of magic---as if no natural process whatsoever is remotely capable of producing a reliable cognitive faculty.<br /><br />Secondly, not everything the brain does has to be for survival. Survival alone does not guarantee reproductive success, nor does every waking moment of our life have to be consumed by this goal. All that evolution fundamentally requires is for the brain to at least do something, eventually, which contributes more to overall reproductive fitness than could otherwise be achieved without it. You could spend hours of your day, every day, doing nothing but pick your nose and scratch your ass, and natural selection won’t necessarily care. All that it requires is for you to do something else with the remainder of your time that promotes fitness.<br /><br />Thirdly, Inspiring Philosophy seems to be hopelessly confused about the distinction between a process and the product. The mind not just some collection of stored memories and beliefs, nor does it randomly poke blindly at arbitrary philosophical perspectives. Rather, the mind a very complex, interrelated set of processes. Individual beliefs are the result of those processes acting on sensory data as perceived naturally through the environment. Natural selection cannot select for individual beliefs in any direct sense, but can only select for processes that are more or less capable of producing “good” beliefs out of the information they’re given.<br /><br />Remember that if what you believe about the world is true, then in principle, you ought to be able to use that belief to make testable empirical predictions---what consequences tend to follow specific actions under specific conditions? Likewise, by contrapositive, if the predictions of your beliefs fail to produce the expected outcomes, then by definition, such beliefs have to be false. That is the pragmatic, scientific measure for truth itself, which is perfectly consistent with naturalistic philosophy. We may therefore presume, as a matter of rote definition, the existence of a very profound connection between true beliefs and overall reproductive fitness. Natural selection does, in fact, highly favor the development of cognitive faculties that are perfectly capable of producing lots of true beliefs.<br /><br />Notice that the process doesn’t even have to be perfect, either. All that it needs to do is eventually compile enough true beliefs about the world so as to facilitate good decision-making throughout one’s life. At the same time, it must also reject enough false beliefs so as to avoid any catastrophic blunders. If mistakes are made, however, then oh well. All natural selection can do is maybe come up with something better through the next iteration. Either way, it is still perfectly reasonable to expect a natural process to be generally reliable overall, despite also being fallible.<br /><br /><b>[02:35] “Thus as Alvin Plantinga identifies...”</b><br /><br />Seriously? Alvin Plantinga!? The very same Alvin Plantinga who once argued, “It is entirely right, rational, reasonable, and proper to believe in God without any evidence or argument at all.” Are you sure you want to hang your philosophical hat on this guy's arguments?</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /><b>[02:36] “Philosophical naturalism falls into a self-defeating circle where your belief, naturalism is true, must entail you are a product of evolutionary naturalism alone, and therefore all your beliefs are programmed into you to help you survive, including your belief, naturalism is true.”</b>&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />Let’s just assume for a moment that this train of logic is perfectly valid. However, I’m going to replace naturalism with monistic idealism, because that’s IP’s favorite little worldview:<i>&nbsp;</i></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /><i>Your belief, that monistic idealism is true, must entail you are the product of a mentally forged reality contained within the mind of God, and therefore all your beliefs are programmed into you by God, including the belief that monistic idealism is true.</i>&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />Oh my goodness! It’s a circle! Therefore, by IP’s very own logic, we have just debunked his favorite pet theology.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />Obviously there’s something terribly wrong here. Starting with the most glaring problem, it seems that IP utterly fails to grasp the difference between circular reasoning and basic, internal consistency. Because yes, if you hold to a belief in naturalism, even as IP defines it, then it stands to reason that purely natural forces are capable of bringing about human cognitive faculties. If those faculties are inherently reliable at producing true beliefs over time, then it would obviously have to follow that human beings might someday come to the true conclusion that naturalism is, itself, true.<br /><br />That’s not a “self-defeating circle,” you moron. That’s called "self-consistency." It’s a good thing.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />But of course, it gets worse than that. Starting with the very first premise, IP gives the proposition “I believe naturalism is true.” Yet as we already discovered using his very own encyclopedic citation, naturalism is not a specific belief about anything, but rather a formal statement of methodology. To say that you are a naturalist simply means that you probably tend to evaluate synthetic propositions through the methods of empirical science, rather than any sort of naïve a priori system of armchair philosophy. It says nothing about the ultimate nature of reality itself, but only commits you to a specific methodology when investigating claims about reality. The very proposition “I believe naturalism is true” has never once been uttered by an actual naturalist because it’s technically not even a coherent thing to say out loud. The correct phrasing would be more like “I choose to evaluate truth claims through the methods of naturalistic science.”<br /><br />But hey, let’s ignore that problem, too, and just assume IP’s definition anyway. Naturalism is the view that there are no supernatural entities and that evolution is responsible for literally everything about us. Please do tell me, how exactly does IP imagine people came to this conclusion in the first place? Because as far as I can tell, he seems to think all naturalists around the world just assumed their position outright as some kind of rote, axiomatic fiat---as if there were no external justification for that view, whatsoever. Yet rather than point out the obvious case of question-begging that would entail, he instead leads us on some convoluted train of logic that no one has ever argued in the history of science: naturalism is true because “all my beliefs are programmed into me to help me survive,” which is only true because “I am a product of evolutionary naturalism alone,” which in turn is true because “naturalism is true.”<br /><br />Remember that the reason why naturalists reject supernatural entities is because the very idea is fundamentally meaningless to talk about. How do you prove the existence of an entity that, by definition, has no properties and no empirical manifestations? So obviously the justification for naturalism is not “because nature programmed me to believe in naturalism,” nor is it a position that we just presume outright for no apparent reason. The train of logic is not a closed circle, but in fact contains perfectly reasonable justification wholly independent of the claims being presented here.<b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>[02:55] “Several experts have identified this consequence. Philosopher Richard Rorty says.”</b><br /><br />Oh look. An appeal to authority. How cute.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /><b>[03:12] “J. M. Smith never understood why organisms have feelings.”</b><br /><br />Oh look. Another appeal to authority. And this one is a bald-faced argument from ignorance. It's like a two-for-one fallacy! Some random guy you’ve never heard of doesn’t understand feelings, so therefore all biology is completely incapable of explaining them. Is that how this works?<b> </b><br /><br /><b>[03:34] “Even the great Charles Darwin worried, with me the horrid doubt always arises whether the convictions of man’s mind, which has been developed from the mind of the lower animals, are of any value or at all trustworthy?”</b><br /><br />This is the third brainless appeal to authority that IP has made in barely 30 seconds. All it shows it that, apparently, Charles Darwin didn’t have the best handle on philosophy mind or philosophy of pragmatism. And why would he? William James didn’t formally introduce pragmatism to the world until 1898---17 years after this letter was written! So who cares? What is this supposed to prove?</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /><b>[03:50] “Why would it not be most beneficial for survival to have an accurate and true description of reality? Surely an organism who has trustworthy cognitive faculties and knowing what is true, would be the most optimal way to survive. Therefore evolution would select faculties that are designed to know truth.”</b><br /><br />This is the point where it really became painfully obvious to me that Inspiring Philosophy has no functional understanding of basic epistemology. So before anything about this argument can continue, we need to clear up a few misconceptions.<br /><br />It's important to understand that any time we talk about a thing like truth, we're not talking about some intrinsic metaphysical quality of reality itself.&nbsp; Technically, what we're really talking about is a property of propositions. That is to say, <b>propositions can either be true or they can be false, but there is no such thing as raw "essence of truth" interwoven into the fabric of space and time.</b> Speaking more formally, a <b>truth value</b> is classically defined as a member of a binary set that contains the elements "True" and "False.” The purpose of this set is to serve as a kind of marker for linguistic propositions in order to help us measure their epistemic "correctness." What exactly that means is open to some interpretation, but we can give it a rigorous definition through a mechanism known as a<b> truth assignment</b>. Speaking formally again, a truth assignment (also called a <b>truth valuation</b>, or an <b>interpretation</b>) is defined as a mapping function between the set of simple linguistic propositions and the set of binary truth values.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />Pragmatic empirical rationalism, aka science, aka naturalism, is a perfectly well-defined system of truth assignment functions that suffers no problems whatsoever under the arguments presented in this video. A necessary, though not sufficient, measure of true synthetic propositions is the principle of empirical predictability. If some proposition is true, then we must be able to use that proposition to exercise decisions under the expectation of predictable empirical consequences. We therefore cannot prove any synthetic proposition true with absolute certainty, but we can at least expect certain properties from such propositions if and when we ever find them. Likewise, if some propositional framework fails to manifest itself through reliable empirical predictions, then we can confidently assert that such a framework is “false.”<br /><br />While you are certainly welcome to nit-pick the details if you like, that is the broad definition of synthetic truth assignment according to most understandings of scientific naturalism. Supernaturalism, on the other hand, has no truth assignment functions to speak of and cannot even qualify as coherent. Never in the history of philosophy or science has our understanding of anything ever been improved by the presumption of supernatural entities. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /><b>[04:10] “However, Plantinga anticipates this objection and points out the probability of this would be low, or we should remain agnostic if naturalism were true.”</b><br /><br />It’s not a matter of probability, you moron. It’s a matter of definition. A “true” synthetic proposition is philosophically measured by the capacity to logically formulate decisions under the expectation of predictable, empirical consequences. If some empirical prediction fails to produce the expected result, then by definition, that belief is now false. In what logical universe does the ability to predict and shape the fucking future have low correlation with reproductive fitness?</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /><b>[04:18] “There is no necessarily equivocation between what is what is useful is what is true.”</b><br /><br />Nobody has ever argued that usefulness is equivalent to truth; only that empirical predictability should be a necessary property of truth. Not only is this argument a complete strawman, but Inspiring Philosophy knows it is. I know he knows because I have personally explained this very same misconception to him long before the video was even made! (see comment sections <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5mKgGs-CLgc" target="_blank">here</a>). So not only is IP just plain wrong in his explanation of basic epistemology, but he is also willfully lying about it, too.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />The pragmatic, scientific perspective of truth has always been grounded on the idea that empirical predictability is a necessary, though not sufficient, measure of true synthetic propositions. You don’t have to apply every proposition towards something practical or “useful” in order to call it true. However, in order for some belief to eventually produce practical applications, then it probably needs to contain at least some reasonable approximation of the truth, doesn't it? Maybe not perfectly true or inerrant in every detail, but certainly closer to the truth than the alternative.<br /><br />Tell you what. Let’s do a little thought experiment. Consider a possible world where everything I believe about the universe just so happens to be categorically false. However, every single time I make a decision based off of those beliefs, the consequences are maximally predictable and desirable for me anyway. Likewise, any time I commit a single "true" belief to action, the outcome is never predictable or desirable for me at all. I ask you, given such a world, is it even meaningful to call any of my beliefs "false?” And if so, why would I ever want to believe anything that was true? I could spend my entire life being completely wrong about absolutely everything and actually be better off for it.<br /><br />So yes, we must conclude that, while not perfectly equivalent, true beliefs are necessarily correlated with usefulness and reproductive fitness, doncha think?<br /><br /><b>[04:20] “Some things can be useful while not being true. Take Ptolemaic astronomy. For centuries, this model was used to help us in navigation and star charting. It was useful, but not a true description of reality. And of course, later was replaced by a more accurate model.”</b><br /><br />Pray tell, Mr “Inspiring” Philosophy, but how exactly would you go about disproving the geocentric model of our solar system? Do you really think that a supernatural, immaterial force is responsible for planetary motion? Did Jesus tell Copernicus in a dream that the sun was the center of the solar system? Or, just maybe, do you think that geocentric models consistently fail to make reliable, empirical predictions? You know, pragmatic, scientific naturalism?<br /><br />Let’s not forget that the primary reason why people objected to heliocentrism is precisely because it violated the supernatural presuppositions of religious dogma. It wasn’t naturalism that censored Galileo’s findings, but the immaterial, supernatural convictions of the Roman Catholic Church. How stupid do you have to be when your best example of the failures of naturalism is actually one of its greatest triumphs?<br /><br /><b>[04:36] “However, if naturalism is true, our knowledge could be analogous to Ptolemaic astronomy; simply a useful model to help us get through the world.”</b><br /><br />Yes, a model that was only proven false through the methods of naturalistic science and which religious zealous refused to give up because of their <i>a priori</i> supernatural convictions!<br /><br />Again, what process do you have for measuring the truth of synthetic propositions that works any better? Remember that you’re the one arguing against naturalism, here. So why don’t you show us all exactly how you propose to disprove Ptolemaic astronomy without appealing to naturalism or naturalistic methods?</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /><b>[04:50] “So just because our knowledge works in practical measures, that doesn’t make it true of what reality is. Take another example: qualia; specifically color. In nature, external objects reflect EM waves, which hit the human eye to create biochemical states, which is transmitted to the brain as neural patterns in the primary visual cortex. If naturalism is true, the brain would somehow create color from this data as a useful model. The original wavelengths have no color. Color is, as John Locke states, secondary qualities, or contents of the mind. The emergent wavelengths are perceived in the eyes and created in the brain, and apart from the brain, color doesn’t exist.&nbsp; So color is simply useful model created by the brain, but not actually what exists in nature.”</b><br /><br />Where is IP even going with this? He seems to claiming that, according to naturalism, color is just a subjective sensory perception. It doesn’t “exist” in any objective sense of the word, but simply manifests as a purely mental construct.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />Okay… and? Is this supposed to be controversial or upsetting in some way? That’s just basic color theory. Everyone knows that color doesn’t really exist as some intrinsic property of real objects. So where’s the beef? What’s the alternative? How exactly does the presumption of supernatural entities change any of this? Even if magic were real and God was in charge of everything, then color would still only exist as a subjective human perception.<br /><br /><b>[05:34] “And if the brain does this with color, it can equally be argued it does it with our knowledge. It is not necessarily true, but a useful model we are programmed to think is true to help us survive.”</b><br /><br />At this point, Inspiring Philosophy just goes on to repeat himself a bunch, all while making nonsensical arguments against his made-up conception of naturalism. The whole thing can pretty much be summarized with the phrase “this person has no comprehension of basic epistemology.” He likes to drop the word “truth” everywhere, despite making no real effort to define what truth is or how we’re supposed to recognize truth when we see it. He also complains a lot that naturalism cannot provide us with absolute knowledge about objective reality, despite the fact that skepticism and fallibilism are actually fundamental principles embraced by philosophers and scientists alike. He then offers no alternative methodology that could presumably do any better, all while habitually insisting that true beliefs about objective reality cannot possibly correlate with reproductive fitness.<br /><br />Just stop and ask yourself right now, why do you even bother believing anything at all? What difference does it make whether or not that information crammed in your head is true? The only meaningful explanation is so that we can eventually use that information as a guide for our actions. Decisions based on true beliefs will manifest themselves in the form of controlled, predictable experiences, while decisions based on false beliefs will eventually fail in that goal. Any beliefs that refuse to drive any actions whatsoever, even in principle, are little more than useless rhetorical gibberish. They don’t do anything, and thus make no difference if we call them true or false.<br /><br />This is what makes pragmatic scientific naturalism is the ultimate measure of all philosophical truth. It's the only system with any functional relevance! If you cannot present your argument within the bounds of such a methodology, then by definition, you are not being reasonable. The moment IP rejected pragmatism, all he did was sever any philosophical connection between beliefs, actions, and consequences. It therefore makes no difference what alternative he thinks he has because the very idea of trying to think of one is tantamount to vapid sophistry. I could unilaterally concede his entire position outright and literally nothing in my life would have to change as a result. That’s how hopeless his position is. Even if he “wins,” he still loses.<br /><br />Thanks for reading.<br /><br /></div>AnticitizenXhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05041380277822761284noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9068953745226541087.post-84288406340692087602016-07-10T13:09:00.004-07:002016-07-17T12:06:35.331-07:00A Challenge to Feminists and Social Justice Advocates<div style="text-align: justify;"><br />This is a challenge to all self-proclaimed feminists and social justice advocates in the United States of America.&nbsp; More specifically, this is a challenge to all of you who sincerely believe that institutionalized sexism is responsible for the <a href="http://www.iwpr.org/initiatives/pay-equity-and-discrimination" target="_blank">gender wage gap</a> in the United States.&nbsp; I am personally giving this challenge in all sincerity to prove an important myth in popular feminist narratives across the first world. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Dear Feminists and Social Justice Advocates,</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">I defy you to cite for me a single example of anyone within the United States who satisfies the following conditions:</div><ol style="text-align: justify;"><li>Is a woman,</li><li>Is performing equal quality/quantity of work to her male peers within the same company,</li><li>Is being paid less per hour than those male peers,</li><li>Is demonstrably being paid less than her male peers <b>because </b>she is female and they are male.</li></ol><div style="text-align: justify;">Seriously.&nbsp; Name me a single example of this happening anywhere.&nbsp; Give the names of any individuals involved, the work they do, and the companies they work for.&nbsp; One.&nbsp; Single.&nbsp; Example.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Now before you even think about providing an answer, please consider the following proposition. By definition, the moment you satisfy my challenge, you will immediately have satisfied the necessary burden of proof for a lawsuit under the <a href="https://www.eeoc.gov/eeoc/publications/fs-epa.cfm" target="_blank">Equal Pay Act</a>.&nbsp; I therefore have to ask, <b>why the fuck are you wasting your time with me when you should be out talking to a good lawyer?</b>&nbsp; Seriously guys, did no one ever tell you that it is officially illegal in the United States to pay women less than men for doing the same work? &nbsp;You people love to rant and rave about all this institutional sexism and gender wage disparity, yet I don't see a whole lot of lawsuits being filed.&nbsp; Did it never occur to you that, just maybe, the gender wage gap is a tiny bit more nuanced than men in power unilaterally discriminating against women under their employment?</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Now to be fair, perhaps you believe that gender pay sexism is more subtle than that.&nbsp; Maybe businesses are just really clever in hiding their reasons for paying women less than men, but dammit, the sexism is still there!</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">All right, fine.&nbsp; <u><b>Prove it.</b></u>&nbsp; The very nature of this argument is an open admission you don't have any evidence to back yourself up.&nbsp; Ergo, you don't really "know" that sexism is the reason for some instance of gender pay disparity, and all you're doing is speculating blindly.&nbsp; So get off your ass, do your due diligence, and prove it!&nbsp; I cannot stress this enough, guys.&nbsp; <b>The moment you have the hard evidence necessary to prove any form of gender discrimination, you now have the legal ammunition required to stomp it out of existence.</b>&nbsp; The mere fact that any of it exists in the first place can therefore only be the result of your own personal inaction. <br /><br />So honestly, guys.&nbsp; What exactly is stopping you?&nbsp; The entire weight of the United States federal government is standing by, ready to come to your aid.&nbsp; All you have to do is back up your assertions with cold, hard, evidence.<br /><br />Then again, that's exactly your problem, isn't it?</div>AnticitizenXhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05041380277822761284noreply@blogger.com20tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9068953745226541087.post-85098287468272730962016-07-10T12:35:00.002-07:002016-07-31T13:02:44.015-07:00There is No Such Thing as a Necessary Being<div style="text-align: justify;"><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <o:OfficeDocumentSettings> <o:RelyOnVML/> <o:AllowPNG/> </o:OfficeDocumentSettings></xml><![endif]--><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Here's a quote by Alvin Plantinga explaining the idea of necessary existence.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">&nbsp;</span> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">"A necessary being is one that can't fail to exist, no matter how things have been.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Or we can say that a necessary being is one that exists in every possible world, where a possible world is a way things could have been.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Sort of a "total" way things could have been; it says something about everything.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>One of these possible worlds is actual, the rest of them aren't...<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>A necessary being is one such that for any world at all, if it had been actual, it would have existed."</span></i><span style="line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">&nbsp;</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Before I respond to this claim, I think it’s worth pointing out that this is something Alvin Plantinga genuinely believes in.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>The guy has written multiple books on this exact subject and even publicly defends them at every opportunity.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Popular Christian apologists like William Lane Craig have likewise appealed to this same idea whenever they argue for God’s existence.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Christian fanboys on YouTube will even publish multi-part video series wherein they explain and defend this principle in elaborate detail.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>So I just want to be clear that this is not a fringe, philosophical claim, but a standard go-to principle within mainstream Christianity.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; The word "</span>God" is defined to mean a "maximally great being," wherein maximal greatness is defined in such a way that includes the property of necessary existence in all possible worlds.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Therefore, God exists in all possible worlds.</span>&nbsp;</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">Now let’s unpack what exactly is going on here.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Whenever we talk about possible worlds, it’s important to understand that we're simply talking about ways our reality might have been.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>For example, maybe you can imagine some possible world just like ours, only where George Clooney is the president of the United States rather than Barack Obama.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>That’s perfectly all right, and a lot of good philosophy is built on imagining all sorts of wacky what-if scenarios.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span><br /><br />But what is a <b>world</b>, really?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Because when we talk about possible worlds, we don’t mean to imply literal, alternative realities just floating around “out there” in some cosmic multiverse ensemble.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Rather, when you really get down to the nuts and bolts of it,<b> a possible world is nothing more than a formal collection of propositions and truth values</b>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>It’s like a giant book where someone has painstakingly written down every coherent proposition there is to make about our reality, followed by a simple check mark indicating true or false next to each one.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>That book, if one were to be constructed, would represent one possible world, and there are an infinite number of such books, or worlds, we could conceivably create.&nbsp; And if, by some fluke, we should ever happen to write a book that perfectly describes our present objective reality as it really is, then that book would be called the <b>actual world</b>.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">Notice, however, that if we're going to describe our world using propositions, then we can’t just randomly assign truth values willy-nilly.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>No matter what collection of propositions we use to describe some potential state of affairs, those propositions still have to obey the basic laws of logic.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>For example, consider the proposition <b><i>George Clooney is the president of the United States <u>and</u> George Clooney is <u>not</u> the president of the United States</i></b>.&nbsp; What if, for some reason, my world just so happens to assign a value of TRUE to this proposition?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Obviously, my world now contains a logical contradiction and thus, by the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principle_of_explosion" target="_blank">principle of explosion</a>, cannot coherently describe anything whatsoever.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>All such worlds that violate the laws of logic are therefore said to be <b>impossible </b>because they are not formally allowed within our hypothetical set of what-if scenarios.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">In contrast, consider what happens when you encounter a proposition like <b><i>Either George Clooney is the president <u>or</u>George Clooney is <u>not</u> the president</i>.</b> Obviously, this proposition is a logical tautology and therefore must be true under every possible interpretation.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Any proposition in this category is therefore said to be <b>necessary </b>because it must always be assigned a value of TRUE in every logically consistent world.&nbsp; The very rules of logic don't allow for anything else.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><a href="http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/propositions/" target="_blank">This is all pretty straightforward material so far,</a> and you can probably see why philosophers might get a lot of productive mileage out of conversing within this framework.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>We like imagining how the world might have turned out differently, and we like having a formal set of rules for discussing any scenarios.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>That’s why modal logic is such a popular system for guiding philosophical conversations.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>However, modal logic is still a really flimsy system, and it doesn’t take much effort to trick yourself into deriving total nonsense.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>For example, <i><b>imagine a possible world where all bachelors have three wives</b></i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Sounds like a contradiction, right? <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp;</span>After all, by definition, a bachelor is an unmarried man, while marriage, by definition, implies a man with at least one wife.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>So to say that you are imagining a bachelor with three wives is the logical equivalent to imagining <i><b>a man with no wives that has wives</b></i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>You can’t do it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>The words are literally put together wrongly, which is why any attempt to imagine such a world is said to be <b>necessarily impossible</b>.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">Now watch what happens if I arbitrarily decide to redefine the word bachelor.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Instead of being an unmarried man, I want the word bachelor to mean <i><b>a married man with three wives</b></i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>After all, it’s just a word, right?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>I’m free to define my terms however I please, am I not? <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp;</span>Maybe I can even convince the staff at Webster’s dictionary to go along with my definition, thus rendering it totally official within the English language.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Now it’s not only logically possible for bachelors to have three wives but also logically necessary!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>They can’t NOT have three wives, because the basic definition of the word doesn’t allow for anything else.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Thus, by claiming that all bachelors have three wives, I have just stated the logical equivalent to <i><b>all men with three wives are men with three wives</b></i> – a necessary logical tautology.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">Hopefully you can see why this might be a problem in that I can now derive any necessary truth I want, simply by playing with my definitions. I could define Santa Claus as <i><b>a being that exists</b></i>, and that fact would necessarily be true in all possible worlds because any being that exists is, tautologically, a being that exists.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Any attempt to imagine a possible world without Santa Claus is now logically impossible because the very phrase <i><b>Santa Claus does not exist</b></i> is now the logical equivalent to saying <i><b>A being that exists does not exist</b></i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>It cannot possibly be true!</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">Notice how this is exactly what Christian apologists are trying to do whenever they describe God as a necessary being.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>God is, by definition, <b>a maximally great being</b>; and maximal greatness, by definition, includes the property of <b>existing in all possible worlds</b>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Therefore, by definition, <i><b>God is necessarily a being that exists in all possible words</b></i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>God cannot fail to exist, because again, the very phrase <i><b>God does not exist</b></i> is the logical equivalent to saying <i><b>A being that exists does not exist</b></i>.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">Obviously, something is terribly wrong here <b>in that you can’t just go around defining things into existence!</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>After all, if you get to define God as a being that exists, then I get to define God as a being that does not exist.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Not only is God’s existence now false, but also necessarily false in all possible worlds.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Now what, Christians?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; My definition is just as valid as yours.&nbsp; W</span>ho wins?<br /><br />This is a really interesting dilemma to me because it forces us to address two fundamental philosophical questions:<br /><ol><li>How do language definitions work?&nbsp; That is to say, what's the point of defining things in the first place? </li><li>What does it mean to say that a thing exists?&nbsp; Why is existence different from other ideas in language definition?</li></ol>To begin, simply consider the tautological proposition that <b><i>all unmarried men are unmarried men</i></b>; a necessary proposition to be sure, but also completely vapid and meaningless.&nbsp; Sure, I can go then ahead and define the word bachelor to mean <i><b>unmarried man</b></i>, but you'll notice that nothing about this situation fundamentally changes.&nbsp; The proposition that <b><i>all bachelors are unmarried men</i></b> is still the same, vapid tautology, but spoken in fewer syllables.&nbsp; So unless you're perfectly satisfied with empty, meaningless substitution, we need to find something outside of mere wordplay on which to ground our use of language.<br /><br />With that in mind, consider what happens when we formulate our language definitions in the form of a conditional, empirical proposition:</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><i><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">IF</b> on some rare occasion I should happen to encounter the empirical manifestation of an entity that is apparently both a man and unmarried, <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">THEN</b> I will formally choose to call such a thing a “bachelor.”</i><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp;</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><i><b>Now</b></i> we have a definition with real, functional merit.&nbsp; Rather than mindlessly swap words for other words, we instead use language to place labels on distinct sensory experiences.&nbsp; It's a little thing called the <a href="https://www.britannica.com/topic/verifiability-principle" target="_blank">verifiability criterion of meaning</a>, and it represents the ultimate foundation for all human language itself.&nbsp; Any time I state some language definition, then in principle I have to be able to use that definition to identify distinct elements within my immediate sensory environment.&nbsp; Without this empirical foundation, all human language immediately collapses back into a meaningless, tautological void.<br /><br />Now that we have a working conception of what definitions are supposed to accomplish, we can finally consider what happens whenever I try to lump existence into the definition of some word<b>:</b></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><i><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">IF</b> on some rare occasion I should happen to encounter the empirical manifestation of an entity that is apparently a man, unmarried, and <b><u>existing</u></b>, <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">THEN</b> I will formally choose to call such a thing a “bachelor.”</i><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp;</span><br /><br /><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">You may not notice it right away, but there’s really something strangely off about this statement.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Because if I should ever just so happen to encounter the empirical manifestation of <b>anything</b>, then it seems pretty safe to conclude that <b>this is also apparently a thing that exists</b>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Likewise, if I should ever happen to imagine a world that contains no bachelors for me to ever empirically identify, even in principle, then it should go without saying that bachelors don’t exist in such a world.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">This is an important observation to make because it means that existence is inherently meaningless and redundant when stated as a formal property of bachelors.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span><b>The set of all things I can empirically identify as bachelors must, by definition, also be things that exist.</b> It therefore makes no difference whether or not I define bachelors as existing <b>because the set of all things that qualify for such a label is logically identical either way</b>.&nbsp; However, since we can readily imagine a logically possible world that contains no bachelors, it immediately follows that <b>we can likewise imagine a possible world that contains no bachelors that "exist</b>." Again, this has to be the case because the two sets are still logically identical. Yet the very idea of a world without bachelors is quite literally the textbook definition of a world where bachelors don't exist in the first place.&nbsp; We therefore must conclude that <b>things which exist as a matter of definition can, apparently, not exist!</b><br /><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">This is where we get the famous philosophical principle that <a href="http://www.philosophyofreligion.info/theistic-proofs/the-ontological-argument/st-anselms-ontological-argument/existence-is-not-a-predicate/" target="_blank"><b>existence is not a predicate</b></a>.&nbsp; It means that whenever we say a thing exists, we cannot possibly refer to some essential property of the thing itself. &nbsp;Rather, what we’re really describing is a property of the objective reality in which this thing is allegedly contained.&nbsp; In fact, if you really want to get technical about things, the very phrase<b><i> Bachelors are things that exist</i></b> is not even a valid proposition to make in the first place.&nbsp; Rather, the <i><u>correct</u> </i>phrasing is more like <b><i>There exist bachelors</i></b>, or <b>The set of all bachelors is nonempty.<i>&nbsp; </i></b><i><u>That</u></i> is how existence functions as a proper, logical operation, because that is how it is implicitly defined within first-order logic.&nbsp; There is no such thing as a set of "things that exist" but rather only sets of things that are either occupied or empty.&nbsp; Necessary existence is therefore <b><u>not</u></b> logically possible because <b>it is logically incoherent to even talk about it in the first place</b>. </div><br />Bear in mind now that all this practically boils down at the end of the day is the rather obvious principle that <b>reality doesn't care how you define words</b>.&nbsp; I could define myself as the undisputed King of America, but that does not mean I can just waltz up to the White House and expect everyone to start treating me like royalty.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Christians can likewise define God as a thing that exists, but that does not magically require objective reality itself to contain anything worthy of that label.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Yet that’s exactly what Christian philosophers like Alvin Plantinga are trying to do whenever they describe God through this nonsensical property of necessary existence! <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp;</span>So let’s just cut through the bullshit for one second and state the obvious out loud:</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><i><b>Imagine a possible world where God does not exist.</b></i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">Now ask yourself, was that sentence somehow utterly incomprehensible to you?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Is there some formal contradiction buried in that claim we somehow missed?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Does the very idea of objective reality itself get violated simply by our failure to insert a thing worthy of the label “God?”</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">No!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Of course not!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>There is nothing incoherent about the proposition that God does not exist. <b>Any attempt to force the issue as a matter of definition is, in and of itself, a logical impossibility</b>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>The very definition of objective reality itself is arguably just the collection of all things that persist independently of human say-so.&nbsp; And what are language definitions, if not the epitome of subjective mental constructs, asserted into being by literal human say-so?&nbsp; So when Christians go out of their way to inherently define God as a thing that necessarily exists, <b>they’re ironically forcing the concept of God directly into the realm of necessary NON-existence!</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Nothing exists necessarily because the very idea itself literally means “existence by definition."<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">On personal note, this is once again why I just have no respect for religious philosophers and apologists. <b>I should seriously not have to explain to these people that you cannot just define things into existence.</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp;&nbsp; </span>Yet here is Alvin Plantinga himself, the very cream of academic Christian philosophy, apparently failing to wrap his brain around this simple little concept.&nbsp; It’s just inexcusable how grossly incompetent these people are.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; <b>Their very best effort to prove God's existence is nothing but an inadvertent proof that God cannot logically exist at all!</b>&nbsp; S</span>o until Christian apologists finally learn the difference between words and reality, I’m just going to keep treating them like the philosophical children that they are.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">Thanks for listening.</div>AnticitizenXhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05041380277822761284noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9068953745226541087.post-90960626648020037682016-07-04T11:13:00.005-07:002016-07-10T23:15:32.517-07:00A Formal Response to Inspiring Philosophy<div style="text-align: justify;"><br />A long time ago <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jt2dywK1RZs" target="_blank">I made a video</a> that dismantled the Modal Ontological Argument for God's Existence as presented by <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RQPRqHZRP68" target="_blank">Inspiring Philosophy</a>.&nbsp; To IP's credit, he later put together a formal response to my video called <a href="https://inspiringphilosophy.wordpress.com/2014/08/31/anticitizenxs-maximally-great-field-of-straw-men/#respond" target="_blank">AntiCitizenX's Maximally Great Field of Straw Men</a>.&nbsp; You can tell that he put a lot of work into his response, so I feel that I owe him a formal rebuttal.&nbsp; This is philosophy, after all, and good philosophy rests on a proper exchange of ideas. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Dear Inspiring Philosophy,</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">What part of "<b>You cannot prove God's existence by rote definition</b>" does your idiotic, peon brain fail to understand?</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Thanks for reading.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div>AnticitizenXhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05041380277822761284noreply@blogger.com12tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9068953745226541087.post-72873461089633115512016-02-04T08:11:00.002-08:002016-06-20T22:24:31.935-07:00Christian Apologists Fail at History.<div style="text-align: justify;"><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <o:OfficeDocumentSettings> <o:RelyOnVML/> <o:AllowPNG/> </o:OfficeDocumentSettings></xml><![endif]--></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:WordDocument> <w:View>Normal</w:View> <w:Zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:TrackMoves/> <w:TrackFormatting/> <w:PunctuationKerning/> <w:ValidateAgainstSchemas/> <w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:IgnoreMixedContent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:DoNotPromoteQF/> <w:LidThemeOther>EN-US</w:LidThemeOther> <w:LidThemeAsian>X-NONE</w:LidThemeAsian> 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Name="Bibliography"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="39" QFormat="true" Name="TOC Heading"/> </w:LatentStyles></xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 10]><style> /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Liberation Serif","serif"; mso-fareast-language:ZH-CN; mso-bidi-language:HI;} </style><![endif]--> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">So Inspiring Philosophy is making a video series detailing his case for the historical resurrection of Jesus (<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ErnJF_nwBk" target="_blank">link</a>).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; B</span>eing true to form, pretty much everything he says is categorically wrong.&nbsp; Consequently, any specific point-by-point analysis would simply take forever and waste everyone's time.&nbsp; That's why instead, I'm just going to cut to the heart of the matter and talk about the fundamental philosophical failing of this entire argument. </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">To begin, when apologists like Inspiring Philosophy talk about "evidence" for the resurrection of Jesus, it's important to be absolutely clear about what that means.&nbsp; In short, the sum total of all evidence for the historical resurrection of Jesus Christ has only ever been the written accounts contained within the New Testament - <b>literally, the pure, unfettered say-so of human authors.</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp;&nbsp;</span><br /><br />That's it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp;&nbsp;</span><br /><br />Now ordinarily, that isn't necessarily such a bad thing thing.&nbsp; After all, a lot of our historical knowledge definitely comes from basic human narratives.&nbsp; However, there are standards you have to follow when evaluating the reliability of various written accounts.&nbsp; Some documents meet those standards very rigorously, and are therefore objectively reliable in their historicity.&nbsp; Other documents, like the Biblical gospels, completely fail to meet these standards at every opportunity; copies of copies (of copies!) of anonymous, secondhand accounts, written decades after the fact, translated through multiple language barriers, riddled with known corruptions, contradictions, and plagiarisms, then culminating with fantastic descriptions of physically impossible events.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; That is the level of evidence Christian apologists would have you believe when evaluating historical claims </span><br /><br />So before the argument has even begun, the case for the resurrection of Jesus is already completely sunk.&nbsp; The canonical gospels are not reliable historical accounts, and nothing they claim can be taken at face value.&nbsp; Yet despite these glaring failures, Christian apologists would still have you believe that these accounts are perfectly representative of reality - <b>as if, God-forbid, that no human narrative could ever possibly record events that didn't really happen.&nbsp;&nbsp;</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">But hey, you know what?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Fine.&nbsp; Let's play their game.&nbsp; If Christians want to trust in human testimony so badly, then let's look at some other human testimonies, shall we? &nbsp;For example, consider this [<a href="https://www.lds.org/scriptures/pgp/js-h/1?lang=eng" target="_blank">link</a>]:</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">This is called the Joseph Smith History.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>I defy <b>you</b>, Inspiring Philosophy, and all your little fanboys, to read this document in full detail.&nbsp; Then, when you finish, come back and tell me how reliable human testimony really is.&nbsp; Because I can tell you right now, everything about this document is objectively more historically reliable than the Biblical narratives.&nbsp; For instance:</div><ol><li>We actually have the original manuscripts.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Not copies of copies of copies - the true, honest-to-goodness originals in their original ink.&nbsp; You cannot say that about the gospels.&nbsp;&nbsp; </li><li>The author is not anonymous, but has in fact signed and dated his own signature on the original manuscripts.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; You cannot say that about the gospels.</span></li><li>The original manuscripts are written in English, and have not been translated through any languages.&nbsp; You cannot say that about the gospels.</li><li>The manuscripts are genuine first-hand accounts. &nbsp;<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"></span>The author is not merely relaying events to us from someone else's point of view, but is, in fact, writing his own autobiography.&nbsp; You cannot say that about the gospels.</li></ol><div style="text-align: justify;"></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">Now please, do tell us, Mr. "Inspiring" Philosophy. &nbsp;How trustworthy is human testimony?&nbsp; Do you honestly believe Joseph Smith when he claims to have been visited, in literal person, by God, the Father and Jesus Christ?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Do you believe his testimony that both God and Jesus told Joseph to restore the true gospel as recorded in the Golden Plates of Nephi?&nbsp; Do you trust him when he claims to have been visited, on numerous occasions, by angels?&nbsp; It's all first-hand testimony, guys, written down in black and white.&nbsp; Why would he make this stuff up?&nbsp; Is Joseph Smith a prophet, a liar, or a lunatic?</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">But wait, there's more!&nbsp; You don't have to just take Joseph Smith's word for it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Listen to the <a href="https://www.lds.org/scriptures/bofm/three?lang=eng" target="_blank">Testimony of the ThreeWitnesses</a>: Oliver Cowdery, David Whitmer, and Martin Harris.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Again, firsthand, eyewitness testimony, all signed and dated.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>All three of these guys swear, in writing, that they personally handled the Golden plates of Nephi, and that a no-shit angel even visited them to prove its authenticity.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">What's the matter?&nbsp; Don't you trust human eyewitness testimony?</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">Or better yet.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Don't just believe those guys.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>There are <a href="https://www.lds.org/scriptures/bofm/eight?lang=eng" target="_blank">eightmore eyewitness accounts</a>, signed and dated, all testifying to the existence of the Golden plates of Nephi.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">Okay, maybe you think think Joseph Smith was a liar; a liar who somehow cleverly fooled everyone around him into giving up their homes and their livelihoods to migrate west. &nbsp;Then why, pray tell, would he rather die at the hands of an angry mob, than simply recant his testimony?<br /><br />That's right, Champ.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Joseph_Smith" target="_blank">Joseph Smith was literally martyred</a>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Look it up.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Does that sound like the actions of a liar to you?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Why would someone cling to a lie, even if it meant his own death?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">Sound familiar at all?&nbsp; Am I ringing any bells, yet?</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">And it doesn't just end there. Thanks to Joseph Smith and his descendants, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints is now a global organization that boasts well over 15 million members.&nbsp; You can even ask them in person, and plenty of them will be more than happy to share their own, personal testimonies on the authenticity of the Book of Mormon, as revealed by the direct personal witness of the Holy Spirit.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp;&nbsp;</span><br /><br /><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">Remember now, guys.&nbsp; You're the ones who think eyewitness testimony is a viable standard of evidence.&nbsp; So please, do tell us,</span> how exactly is the Bible a reliable, historical narrative, yet not the Joseph Smith History or the Book of Mormon?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; There does not exist a single argument you can offer against the truth of their claims that does not also apply equally well against your own.&nbsp; </span>Either</div><ol><li><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"></span>Joseph Smith was telling the truth.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Or</li><li><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"></span>He was not.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span></li></ol><div style="text-align: justify;">Take your pick, guys! <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp;</span>This is a perfect logical dichotomy you cannot win.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>If your answer is (1), then you immediately admit that Mormonism is the correct religion, and your own faith is invalid.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; But since that's obviously not an option with you people, your</span> only other claim is necessarily (2); that sometimes, gee whiz, <b>people can, for whatever reasons, actually write fantastic things down on paper that didn't really happen in real life</b>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp;</span> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">Wow!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Who'd a thunk?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>People can actually record things that didn't really happen?&nbsp; What is this sorcery?<br /><br /><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">What's more, you further concede that those same works of fiction can actually be so compelling as to convince many thousands of people to abandon their homes and migrate hundreds of miles, even in the face of violent opposition from the state.&nbsp; You admit that this same fiction can even sprout into a full-fledged religious ideology, complete with several tens of millions of members only a few hundred years later.&nbsp; You further admit that these same organizations can even willfully sanitize their own history, effectively downplaying the less appealing events from their past, while simultaneously embellishing the more positive, even to the point of <a href="https://www.lds.org/scriptures/jst?lang=eng" target="_blank">rewriting other historical events which preceded their arrival</a>.&nbsp; Finally, you must likewise concede that this is apparently a perfectly common phenomenon, as given by the fact that hundreds, if not thousands, of similar religious sects have all followed very similar trends across human history.&nbsp;&nbsp;</span> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">Well, guess what? &nbsp;You now just admitted that your entire case for the resurrection of Jesus is utterly vapid.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span><b>A bunch of people claim on paper that Jesus rose from the dead, and you're stupidly gullible enough to take them completely at their word.</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>That's your entire resurrection case in a nutshell.<br /><br />Thank you for listening.</div><br /><br /><br /><div style="text-align: justify;"></div>AnticitizenXhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05041380277822761284noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9068953745226541087.post-11472053743005215962016-01-01T16:01:00.003-08:002016-01-09T11:22:42.543-08:00How Words Work<div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">If you're the kind of person who likes to study philosophy, then you probably understand the importance of rigorously defining your terms.&nbsp; In fact, I would even argue that this simple task represents the heart and soul of all philosophy itself.&nbsp; "Good" philosophy, in my view, is not so much about directly understanding the world as it really is, but rather about giving meaning to our ideas and exploring the logical relationships between them.&nbsp; Good philosophers understand this, which is why good philosophers always begin theirs discussions by establishing what exactly their words mean, and how to apply them consistently.<br /><br />But of course, with philosophy being what it is, there's always an overflowing tide of amateurs who constantly fail to grasp these basic principles.&nbsp; Consequently, I often find myself spending far more time just asking people what on Earth they think it is they're arguing, rather than engaging them with any fresh, original ideas.&nbsp; Some of these guys are even so bad that I've actually found myself literally explaining to them how words work.&nbsp; It's happens so often, too, that I've honestly found myself simply copy-and-pasting the same, scripted responses to the same, recurring confusions.&nbsp; Yet if it keeps happening this much to me, then it almost certainly must be happening to some of you out there, as well.&nbsp; So to help everyone make better use of their precious philosophical time, here is a short list of common confusions I keep encountering over matters of language and definition.&nbsp; <br /><br /><b>1)&nbsp; How to define words.</b><br /><br />"What do you mean by that?" is probably the most important question anyone can learn to ask when doing philosophy.&nbsp; For example, what do you mean by truth?&nbsp; What do you mean by God?&nbsp; What do you mean when you say "free will?"&nbsp; However, before you can even attempt to answer those questions, you first have to ask yourself, "What does it mean to establish 'meaning' in the first place?"&nbsp; That is to say, how does anyone "define" words?<br /><br />In my experience, there seem to be only two possible methods for defining words.&nbsp; Either (a) you can use words as substitutions for other words, or (b) you can use words as labels for distinct, sense experiences.&nbsp; That's it.&nbsp; There are no other mechanisms in all of philosophy by which anyone can meaningfully define anything.<br /><br />To illustrate the first option, consider a simple word like "bachelor."&nbsp; Obviously, the most common definition is simply "unmarried man."&nbsp; That's a direct, linguistic substitution you can apply at any time.&nbsp; If someone hands you a proposition that has the word "bachelor" in it, all you have to do is scribble it out in your mind and replace it with "unmarried man" to preserve meaning.&nbsp; Substitutions like this are great because they allow us to encapsulate a large series of complex ideas into just a handful of simple words, thereby saving both time and energy in basic communication.&nbsp; However, it's important to understand that all we're doing is swapping mere words for more words, which immediately leads to a problem of regression.<br /><br />To illustrate, suppose I ask you what "unmarried" means.&nbsp; Or maybe what does "man" mean?&nbsp; You might be tempted to define a "man" as "a male member of the human species," but again, I can just ask you what does "human" mean?&nbsp; What does "species" mean?<br /><br />Obviously, you can't just keep swapping words for more words forever.&nbsp; That's why we need to use something outside of pure language in order to ground the meaning of basic words.&nbsp; Yet the only thing I know of that does that is sense data.&nbsp; For example, if I want to ground the meaning "human" to you without relying on pure words, then the only thing I can do is drag out a specimen and just show it to you.&nbsp; [show pictures]&nbsp; Here.&nbsp; This.&nbsp; This is what "humans" look like.&nbsp; Any time I use that term in a sentence, just imagine something like this in your mind.&nbsp; Done.&nbsp; Now my language finally has real meaning.<br /><br />This basic principle also goes to show exactly why it's impossible to ever describe a thing like "redness" to a blind person.&nbsp; The very idea of "red" has no meaning except as a referent for some basic, sense experience.&nbsp; So if you happen to be talking to someone who has never experienced red, and cannot ever hope to experience red, then you simply cannot use that word to express anything meaningful to them.&nbsp; In order to properly function as a communication tool, human language requires some kind of shared sensory experience as a foundation.<br /><br />Notice also how this principle is basically just the positivist idea of verifiability criterion for meaning.&nbsp; Sure, you can substitute words for other words all you want, but sooner or later, you have to ground those words on something empirical to give them meaning.&nbsp; Yet for some strange reason, there are actually people out there who honestly fight against this; as if words actually possessed some kind of magical, intrinsic meaning all by themselves, independent of any empirical reference.&nbsp; It makes no honest sense to me whatsoever, but it does make perfect sense for people like Deepok Chopra; people who likes to impress others with vague, pseudo-profound bullshit, but never tie themselves down to anything concrete.<br /><br /><b>2)&nbsp; All language definitions are fundamentally arbitrary.&nbsp; All of them.</b><br /><br />I don't know how many times I've gotten into an argument with someone who's one and only dispute against me was that "my definition was wrong."&nbsp; That is to say, my definition did not match their definition, and so therefore at least one of us has to be objectively wrong in their use of words.&nbsp; For example, many people have different ideas of what it means to be an "atheist."&nbsp; Do you have to actively deny the existence of God in order to fit that label?&nbsp; Or can you simply be unconvinced that God exists?&nbsp; Likewise, some people define God in terms of the singular, personal deity of classical monotheism, while other people prefer to define God as the accumulation of all physical laws in nature.&nbsp; Who's right?&nbsp; Whose definition is "correct?"<br /><br />The answer, of course, is no one.&nbsp; There is no such thing as an "objectively correct" definition.&nbsp; There are only "good" definitions and "bad" definitions.&nbsp; Good definitions are clear, concise, consistent, distinct, empirically grounded, and generally capture the intuitive notions that people associate with that term.&nbsp; Bad definitions are nebulous, long-winded, incoherent, inconsistent, redundant, or just plain fail to capture what people normally understand that term to mean. "Good" philosophers understand this distinction, which is why "good" philosophers work to hard to establish clear definitions.<br /><br />So the next time you get into a dispute with someone over basic definitions, the question is not "whose definition is correct?"&nbsp; That is a meaningless argument to have.&nbsp; The real question you should be examining is, "which definition works better?"&nbsp; Which one is more consistent?&nbsp; Which one is more descriptive?&nbsp; Which one is more distinct?&nbsp; That sort of thing.&nbsp; Sometimes two different people simply use the same word to mean different things, or even use different words to mean the same thing.&nbsp; Oh well.&nbsp; Language is funny like that, and we just have to live with it.&nbsp; <br /><br /><b>3)&nbsp; Definitions and language have zero influence over objective reality.</b><br /><br />Religious apologists are notorious for this kind of fallacy, and it always grinds my gears every time I see it.&nbsp; For example, take the modal ontological argument for God's existence.&nbsp; God is, by definition, a maximally great being.&nbsp; Maximal greatness, by definition, then includes the property of necessary existence, which, by definition is a thing that exists.&nbsp; Therefore, by definition, God is a thing that exists.<br /><br />Obviously, that kind of argument is completely circular.&nbsp; Yet many modern Christian philosophers actually think this is a compelling train of thought.&nbsp; Some will even go so far as to argue that logic itself is some kind immutable force of nature that magically binds our reality together.&nbsp; For example, how many of you have ever heard reference to "the immutable laws of logic?"&nbsp; That the law of identity cannot ever be violated, or that the universe is bound by the law of noncontradiction?&nbsp; It's a classic form of Platonic realism that is surprisingly popular among wannabe philosophers.<br /><br />But here's the rub.&nbsp; Logic is not some ethereal force interwoven into the fabric of space and time.&nbsp; Rather, a far better way to think of logic is as a highly formalized system of language.&nbsp; The reason contradictions don't exist is not because logic governs the universe, but because contradictions literally don't describe anything!&nbsp; They're just words put together wrongly. The rules built into our language simply don't allow them to cohere into anything meaningful.<br /><br />So there you have it.&nbsp; A quick and dirty primer on how words work.&nbsp; Keep this in mind the next time you encounter some hack philosopher failing to grasp basic principles of human language.</div>AnticitizenXhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05041380277822761284noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9068953745226541087.post-90742178463433913052015-12-01T15:29:00.000-08:002016-01-02T15:39:36.950-08:00A Challenge for Christian Moral Realists<div style="text-align: justify;"><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IFgJ8H0iOmY" target="_blank">Watch the Full Video Here</a></div><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Here's a quick challenge for all Christian moral realists out there who honestly find the moral argument for God's existence compelling.&nbsp; </div><ol style="text-align: justify;"><li>Please name for me a single example of your favorite objective moral value or duty.</li><li>Prove it.</li></ol><div style="text-align: justify;">Seriously.&nbsp; Prove it.&nbsp; You people love to spend hours upon hours bragging about your absolute moral foundations and the objectivity of good and evil, so in theory this should be trivially easy.&nbsp; For example, perhaps you think that killing babies is objectively wrong.&nbsp; Okay, fine.&nbsp; Prove the truth of that proposition: "It is objectively wrong to kill babies."&nbsp; What axioms and rules of inference do you exercise in order to arrive at that conclusion?&nbsp; What truth assignment functions did you use and why?&nbsp; Because honestly, I don't think any one of you have ever once tried to seriously apply a single instance of your own moral philosophy.&nbsp; So put your money where your mouth is and actually demonstrate moral objectivity in action.&nbsp; Don't just assert that objective morals exist - prove it. <br /><br />Now before you even think about submitting a response, there are several pitfalls you need to be aware of.&nbsp; Starting with...</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><br /></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b>Number 1:</b><br /><br />Personal intuition and personal experiences are subjective.&nbsp; In fact, that is literally the most subjective form of proof you could possibly offer.&nbsp; Just because murdering babies "feels" really wrong to you, that does not make it objectively so.&nbsp; What feels absolutely wrong to you could just as easily feel absolutely right to me, and vice versa.&nbsp; So what exactly can you appeal to that extends beyond our personal, subjective preferences in order to settle any dispute?&nbsp; Again, we're looking for a proof; not your naive gut reaction.&nbsp; <b><b>&nbsp;</b></b><br /><br /><b><b>Number 2:&nbsp;</b> </b><br /><br />Human consensus is still subjective.&nbsp; I don't care if a billion people around the world all unanimously agree that killing babies is wrong.&nbsp; A billion subjective evaluations does not prove objectivity.&nbsp; Five hundred years ago, societies from around the world all happily assumed that slavery was perfectly okay, even though today we all tend to think it's evil.&nbsp; So for all we know, maybe killing babies is perfectly good, and everyone on Earth is simply mistaken to think it's evil.&nbsp; Who exactly are you to claim otherwise?&nbsp; What is your proof? <b>&nbsp;</b><br /><br /><b>Number 3:</b><br /><br />Christian moral realism is antithetical to consequentialism.&nbsp; You are therefore not allowed to make any appeal to the positive or negative consequences of our actions with respect to the health, happiness, or well-being of human social groups.&nbsp; That's <u>my</u> moral philosophy, not yours.&nbsp; You rejected that the moment you became a Christian moral realist.<b></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /><b>Number 4: </b><br /><br />Don't even think about mentioning the word "God" in your proof.&nbsp; Ignoring the fact that God is literally a subjective agent, by definition, the whole point of the moral argument is to prove God's existence in the first place.&nbsp; You therefore don't get to use God to prove the objectivity of any moral values because the existence of objective moral values is already supposed to serve as your proof of God.&nbsp; So unless you want to reduce the moral argument to a vapid, circular joke, then this is not a form of argument you get to use. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">There you have it, guys.&nbsp; Show us what you got!&nbsp; Prove the objectivity of just one moral value or duty.<br /><br />Well?&nbsp; I'm waiting...</div>AnticitizenXhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05041380277822761284noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9068953745226541087.post-28159165003800330552015-11-07T11:38:00.000-08:002017-07-11T08:31:15.449-07:00Part 9: Unintelligent Design<div style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: justify;"><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <o:OfficeDocumentSettings> <o:RelyOnVML/> <o:AllowPNG/> </o:OfficeDocumentSettings></xml><![endif]--> <br /><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s4TlUNV-uB4" target="_blank">Click here to view the final video.</a></div><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">There's a reason why science and religion don't get along well with each other.&nbsp; They just can’t help it.&nbsp; The two institutions are diametrically opposed in every philosophical respect.&nbsp; While science is an investigative process designed to foster a pragmatic understanding of reality, religions are cultural memes that seek only to propagate themselves from one generation to the next.&nbsp; Science recognizes our basic psychological weaknesses and even takes active measures to expunge them from our thinking.&nbsp; Religions, however, openly exploit our cognitive biases as a means of deliberately engineering conformity in their membership.&nbsp; Science presumes human fallibility, meaning that any conclusions we may ever reach, no matter how confident they may make us feel, must always remain open to questioning, testing, revision, and even possible dismissal.&nbsp; Yet many religious organizations will happily declare an unwavering conviction to their sacred dogma, even to the point of admitting outright that no amount of evidence or logic will ever change their minds, no matter what [1].</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">This is exactly why religious apologists are always so awkwardly antagonistic whenever it comes to matters of science and scientific method---the very rules which govern them are completely antithetical to their entire sense of epistemology.&nbsp; Yet the conflict can only grow worse over time, because scientific discoveries are always directly challenging core theological claims.&nbsp; For instance, if the Bible is interpreted literally as the true and inerrant word of God, then it necessarily follows that the Earth is barely six-thousand years old, with all of its inhabitants having been specially created in the present forms we see today [2].&nbsp; The first human male was forged out of literal dust from the Earth, followed by the first human female out of the first man's rib.&nbsp; This single human couple incestuously spawned the entire human race, which expanded rapidly from its ancestral origins somewhere in the vicinity of the Euphrates river valley.&nbsp; Then, at some point along the way, a talking snake came along and convinced the first woman to eat forbidden fruit from a magic tree, thereby corrupting the entire natural world with a sudden outburst of sin and death.&nbsp; Finally, the only way to rectify matters is, naturally, through a ritual blood sacrifice to atone for the sins of the entire world and redeem our species from an eternity of spiritual separation from our timeless, immaterial creator [3].<br /><br />Now compare this view with our modern understanding of geology and evolutionary biology.&nbsp; The Earth is not 6,000 years old but well-over four-and-a-half billion.&nbsp; Life is not the special creation of any cosmic, immaterial agents, but most likely an emergent property of rote organic chemistry operating on self-replicating nucleic acids.&nbsp; Human beings are not the product of some top-down organization, but rather a long chain of inherited allele variations, gradually molded by genetic mutation and natural selection.&nbsp; Humanity did not descend through a genetic bottleneck of only two individuals, but instead branched off from earlier hominid populations distributed throughout Africa.&nbsp; There was nothing close to any mystical Garden of Eden, and therefore no original sin, no global flood, no Fall of Man, and <b>no point in dragging out a savior to redeem us from it all in the first place.</b><br /><br />This is a huge discrepancy that Christian apologists cannot ignore, and it goes a long way toward explaining the massive bone they have to pick against the theory of evolution.&nbsp; <b>If the modern scientific paradigm is correct, then the Bible is wrong, plain and simple</b>.&nbsp; Not merely erroneous, mind you, but grossly, inexcusably, and embarrassingly bungled at every conceivable level.&nbsp; Apologists therefore have no choice but to oppose evolution at every turn, because it represents such a direct existential threat to their spiritual and cultural identity.&nbsp; However, they can’t just imprison heretics like they did the good old days, because fortunately most of us are now protected by secular, constitutional governments.&nbsp; Nor can they just flatly reject science out-of-hand, either, because it obviously works so well at improving all of our daily lives.&nbsp; So they have to resort to roundabout cultural and political initiatives, instead, like creationism, creation science, and of course, intelligent design.<br /><br /><i>"The theory of intelligent design holds that certain features of the universe, and of living things, are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as natural selection</i>." [4]<br /><br />Notice how right out of the gate, design theory has effectively declared its own bias <b>in advance</b> by explicitly defining itself in terms of an implied rejection of evolution.&nbsp; It's a classic hallmark that underscores one of the deepest philosophical failures of the entire creationism movement.&nbsp; When it comes to the theory of evolution through natural selection, creationists don't just see yet another scientific explanation for some natural phenomenon.&nbsp; They see a literal "war of the worldviews" between the righteous forces of <b>special creation</b> and the evil onslaught of <b>materialistic evolution</b> [5].&nbsp; It's an absurdly tribal mentality that just ignores the infinite space of logically viable alternatives, opting instead for a distinct us-versus-them presumption in the search for the truth.&nbsp; Consequently, they make no testable, empirical predictions on behalf of the design hypothesis, but instead spend all of their time bashing against evolution---as if the mere virtue of some other theory being wrong or incomplete automatically guarantees that their theory gets to be right.&nbsp; It’s a textbook example of our favorite logical fallacy known as the <b>false dichotomy</b>, and again, guys with actual PhDs will continually fail to recognize it to this very day.<br /><br />To demonstrate, simply consider the famous watchmaker argument of William Paley [7].&nbsp; It's a classic go-to thought experiment that represents the principle line of reasoning behind virtually all intelligent design arguments.<b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span></b>Basically, all it tries to show is that intelligent agents tend to imprint some form of empirically detectable signature on the material objects they create [8].&nbsp; Consequently, if we can only learn to detect this signature in living organisms, then we can presumably use it to prove that life on Earth must be the product of an intelligent agency.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; Thus, as a demonstration case, we are most commonly asked to imagine</span> a granite rock placed in our left hand followed by a gold-plated pocket watch placed in the right.&nbsp; If we are then asked to determine which object is the product of intelligent agency, as opposed to blind geological forces, which object should we pick?<br /><br />Obviously, the immediate intuition is that the pocket watch was designed by intelligent agents while the granite rock was not.&nbsp; Therefore, as the argument goes, there must have been some empirical evidence that led us to this conclusion.&nbsp; Furthermore, since this was an almost trivial distinction that we can render upon rote, visual inspection, it immediately stands to reason that we can likewise trust in that same perception when investigating complex biological structures.<br /><br />For example, take the bacterial flagellum, which is an almost universal favorite among proponents of this argument.&nbsp; U<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">pon close inspection, </span>it certainly does appear to resemble a kind of outboard motor on the nano scale.&nbsp; It’s a spectacular biological machine, composed of a brilliant arrangement of complex, interrelated parts.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>How on Earth could any material process like evolution ever hope to produce such a structure?&nbsp; After all, it’s not like everything just fell together by random happenstance; nor can I personally imagine any particular line of decent by which natural selection could put it together.&nbsp; Therefore, evolution cannot possibly be responsible for the bacterial flagellum, leaving us only with an intelligent, supernatural, immaterial agent, who just so happens to be Yahweh, the omnipotent God of the Bible.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />That may sound like an obtuse parody of a sophisticated philosophical position, but it really is the basic train of thought behind all intelligent design arguments.&nbsp; <b>If it looks designed, then it must be designed, and heaven forbid that any natural process ever hope to mimic such an appearance</b>.&nbsp; Sometimes they’ll even try to dress it up with pseudo technical-sounding jargon like <b>specified complexity</b> or <b>irreducible complexity</b>.&nbsp; But no matter what they call it, the end result is still always the same classic fallacy of <b>arguing from ignorance</b>. Human scientists cannot yet explain some biological thingy to my satisfaction in every last conceivable detail, so therefore a magic wizard in the sky must have done it.&nbsp; </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">But hey, let’s suppose we’re feeling generous and immediately grant the contention that evolutionary biology is nothing but giant hoax, spawned by the devil himself.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; Barring </span>any alternative theories to distract us, what exactly can we learn from the watchmaker argument, in and of itself?&nbsp; Because for all the social bias and political motivation at work here, there really is an interesting philosophical question worth exploring.&nbsp; Namely, how does one “detect” design?&nbsp; That is to say, how do we differentiate between an object of purely natural happenstance, as opposed to the deliberate fabrication of some motivated agent?<br /><br />This is not an easy question to answer, but we can at least begin the discussion by asking ourselves a basic, philosophical question:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Is it really all that <span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">impressive to “detect” the presence of design within a pocket watch?</span></b> <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp;</span>After all, it's not exactly a difficult thing to do when the manufacturer openly announces that fact in the form of recognizable markings scribbled all over the casing.&nbsp; Or if that’s not convincing enough, we can even visit the factories where they’re made and shake hands with the actual designers in person.&nbsp; We also know, with a great deal of confidence, that we will never encounter a single, natural source of pocket watches anywhere on planet Earth. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp;</span>There are no geysers, no rivers, no caves, and no fields where pocket watches just burst out of the ground or fall from the sky, fully formed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />So of course we easily recognize the apparent design in pocket watches because <b>we already know beforehand that they’re designed!</b>&nbsp; The core premise of the whole watchmaker analogy is nothing but a blatant philosophical cheat.&nbsp; It’s like giving you the answers to a test before administering the actual test.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>If the idea of design detection really is as valid of a concept as proponents claim it to be, then in principle we must be able to demonstrate it under controlled, laboratory conditions.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/--APkxQjOI68/WWTtfW0YWHI/AAAAAAAAB2A/3R9Tl5Ascpkx4eH36r11zy0i_9Y3K5LmACLcBGAs/s1600/Slide3.PNG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="180" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/--APkxQjOI68/WWTtfW0YWHI/AAAAAAAAB2A/3R9Tl5Ascpkx4eH36r11zy0i_9Y3K5LmACLcBGAs/s320/Slide3.PNG" width="320" /></a></div><br />For example, consider the two material objects shown above.&nbsp; As you can see, they appear to be nothing more than a couple of rocks that I randomly grabbed off the side of a mountain.&nbsp; However, one of these rocks is special, in that it’s been hand-crafted with deliberate intention for an express purpose.&nbsp; What that purpose is, or how it was crafted, I'm not going to say.&nbsp; All you know is that one of these objects is perfectly natural in its origins while the other has been specifically “designed” by an intelligent agent.&nbsp; Your job is to identify which is which, and do so with statistical reliability.<br /><br />Notice how it's not nearly so simple of a distinction anymore, is it?&nbsp; And when you stop and think about it, why would it be?&nbsp; <b>Rocks are just arbitrary arrangements of material stuff, and the mere virtue of being tampered with by some agent does not magically endow them with any empirically detectable “essence of design."</b>&nbsp; It therefore doesn't matter what methodology you think you have, because <b>the very idea itself is logically incoherent.</b>&nbsp; The only meaningful distinction that exists between an object of nature versus an object of design is, ultimately, the designers themselves.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Who were they?&nbsp; What tools did they use?&nbsp; What processes did they follow?&nbsp; What goals did they serve?&nbsp; How can I replicate them?&nbsp; <b>What tangible, empirical manifestations can we expect to observe and test accordingly, depending on the competing theories?</b>&nbsp; These are the kinds of questions that need to be answered in order to logically defend any design inference and not some cheap appeal to rhetorical intuition.<br /><br />But of course, creationists have no compelling answers to any of these questions other than a very strong insistence that biological systems just really-really look designed, and that no natural process could ever be the reason why.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Sometimes they’ll even admit openly that intelligent design theory cannot actually comment on either the identity or the methodology of their alleged designer [9]; only that somewhere, somehow, for some reason, He just did it anyway.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Yet then, when speaking behind closed doors to their fellow Christians, they just take it for granted that of course the designer was absolutely the God of Christianity, and thank goodness science has finally proven His existence [10].<br /><br />But hey, let’s ignore all of that <b>again </b>and summarily grant the entire contention that human beings really can empirically measure the presence of “design” in material objects.&nbsp; Given that, would it not also stand to reason that we likewise possess the capacity to differentiate between “good” design and “poor” design?&nbsp; After all, biological structures must have been designed for a reason, right?&nbsp; So what's stopping us from objectively measuring their capacity to meet certain goals?&nbsp; If they just so happen to fail outright, then what does that imply about the competency of this alleged designer?<br /><br />For example, consider the blind cave tetra of Central America. It certainly appears to be a perfectly normal fish at first glance, except for this strange, bulbous mass of tissue growing out of its head.&nbsp; It’s weird, because it looks an awful lot like a kind of pseudo-eyeball, yet doesn’t actually provide any functional vision for the fish.&nbsp; So ask yourself, <b>what good is a broken visual receptor on an organism that spends its entire life cycle in perfect darkness?&nbsp; </b>Is that a good design or a bad design?<b> </b><br /><br />Or better yet, consider the human vermiform appendix attached to your very own colon.&nbsp; It's a little, dangling sac that apparently performs no significant role in human biological function, as evidenced by the fact that people remove them all the time without ever suffering any tangible side-effects.&nbsp; Yet every year, hundreds of thousands of these things will spontaneously erupt into painful infections, usually bursting open in a septic mess when left untreated [11].&nbsp; You really therefore have to wonder, <b>what kind of idiot designer deliberately installs a ticking time bomb of misery and death into His supposedly “special” creations?</b></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />Or my personal favorite: <b>smallpox!</b>&nbsp; Everything about this virus is suitable only for the infection and mutilation of human hosts on a global scale.&nbsp; More people have been scarred and killed by smallpox than from all the combined wars and natural disasters in human history.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>If such a thing were truly "designed" by an intelligent agent, then it could only be described as the greatest biological weapon of mass destruction ever created.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />We can do this all day.&nbsp; There are thousands more examples of this stuff scattered all throughout the scientific literature.&nbsp; Biomechanical structures are rarely, if ever, optimal in their apparent functions, and often times serve no other purpose than the continual propagation of pain and suffering.&nbsp; Intelligent design is therefore more than just bad logic and bad science, but also <b>ridiculously bad theology</b>. The argument itself is an argument for a weak, incompetent, and vindictive deity!</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />Notice how we’ve mostly ignored the actual science of evolutionary biology itself, and intelligent design is still objectively wrong on every philosophical level there is.&nbsp; It makes no testable predictions, it builds a false dichotomy, it argues from ignorance, it strawmans the opposition, it attempts to prove a negative, it makes incoherent presumptions, and it ultimately argues for a deity that can only be described as a malicious idiot.&nbsp; The only reason why anyone would ever find this garbage compelling in the first place is because we can't help but intuitively perceive the world in terms of deliberate actions being exercised by consciously motivated agents.&nbsp; It therefore doesn’t matter how awful or fallacious intelligent design may be, because the end conclusion is always going to feel intuitively satisfying to a naïve, unskeptical audience.<br /><br /><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">It's important to understand that whenever we compare things like pocket watches against things like bacterial flagella, there's a very critical distinction that apologists always overlook.&nbsp; Namely, <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">bacteria are alive while pocket watches are not</b>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>That means a self-replicating biological organism subject to billions of years of inherited allele variations and environmental selection in reproduction.&nbsp; It's a perfectly natural and unguided process, physically guaranteed to produce complex, interrelated structures, even to the point of directly mimicking the apparent foresight of human engineers.&nbsp; It's also a terribly sloppy, inefficient process, that has no regard for the well-being of sentient creatures and also no choice but to make do with every bad decision handed down to it from previous iterations.&nbsp; It’s perfectly self-consistent, it makes testable empirical predictions, it can be demonstrated on demand, and it has countless practical applications with real, economic value.<b>&nbsp; </b>It explains everything that intelligent design doesn't, which is why evolution is the only theory of biodiversity with any pragmatic merit.&nbsp;&nbsp;</span> <br /><br />But let’s face facts.&nbsp; None of this matters to the true believers because truth is simply not their ultimate goal with these arguments; <b>it's self-defense!</b>&nbsp; They despise the idea of empirically predictive modeling within a rational, scientific framework because they know perfectly well that Christianity would never be able to survive under such scrutiny.&nbsp; Proponents even admit openly in their own internal documents and public lectures that the very existence of intelligent design is little more than a glorified "wedge"---a purely political initiative intended solely for undermining American science education, thus paving the way for Christian dogma to dominate popular culture [12].&nbsp; This is not just some wild conspiracy theory, either, but a matter of public record already proven decisively in a court of law [13,14].<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>So let's stop deluding ourselves under the naive pretense that this is some kind of rational debate against honest, intellectual opponents.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; <b>Christian apologists hate science, because science is philosophically incompatible with faith.</b>&nbsp; They have to destroy or subjugate science by any means necessary, because failure to do so can only mean a complete sacrifice of all cultural relevance in the 21st century.&nbsp; Intelligent design is nothing but an instrument in that goal, motivated entirely by petty religious intolerance, and not by any sincere regard for objective reality. </span><br /><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp;</span> </div>--------------------- <br /> <br /><b>References</b></div></div><ol style="text-align: justify;"><li>See, for example&nbsp;</li><ul><li><a href="https://www.facebook.com/pages/Nothing-Will-Shake-My-Faith-In-Christ/132542376787442" target="_blank">Nothing will shake my faith</a></li><li><a href="https://answersingenesis.org/about/faith/" target="_blank">AIG Statement of Faith</a></li><li><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S-fDyPU3wlQ" target="_blank">Dealing with Doubt</a></li><li><a href="http://blogs.christianpost.com/confident-christian/what-would-change-your-mind-about-christianity-12562/" target="_blank">What would change your mind about Christianity?</a></li><li><a href="http://www.icr.org/article/168/" target="_blank">Institute for Creation Research</a>&nbsp; </li></ul><li><a href="https://answersingenesis.org/theory-of-evolution/millions-of-years/why-shouldnt-christians-accept-millions-of-years/" target="_blank">Answers in Genesis - Why Shouldn’t Christians Accept Millions of Years?</a></li><li>Genesis, <a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Genesis+1&amp;version=NIV" target="_blank">Chapters 1-3</a> </li><li>See the following references:<br /><ul><li>Casey Luskin - "<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gqem5jtDJqY" target="_blank">What is the Theory of Intelligent Design?</a>"</li><li>Stephen Meyer - "<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ng1EsEWVHjc" target="_blank">Signature in the Cell What is intelligent design?</a>"</li><li>William Dembsky - "<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6WQwAWv41sU" target="_blank">William Dembski Mathematician explain intelligent design!</a>" </li></ul></li><li>Some sources:<ul><li><a href="https://answersingenesis.org/store/product/war-worldviews/?sku=10-2-204" target="_blank">War of the Worldviews</a></li><li><a href="http://www.discovery.org/about/mission" target="_blank">Discovery Institute Mission Philosophy</a></li></ul></li><li>Some references on agenticity:<br /><ul><li>Heider, F. and Simmel, M., "An experimental study of apparent behavior," The American Journal of Psychology, Vol 57, No 2, pp 243 -- 259 (1944)</li><li>Heberlein, A. S. and Adolphs, R. "Impaired spontaneous anthropomorphizing&nbsp; despite intact perception and social knowledge,"&nbsp; Proceedings of the National Academy of Science, Vol 101, No 19, pp 7487 - 7491 (2004)</li><li>Shermer, M. "Agenticity: Why people believe that invisible agents control the world,"&nbsp; Scientific American, Vol 300, No 6, pp 36 (2009)</li><li>Kelemen, D., "The scope of teleological thinking in preschool children," Cognition, Vol 70, No 3, pp. 241 - 272 (1999) </li></ul></li><li>William Paley, <u>Natural Theology</u> (1802) - "<i>In crossing a heath, suppose I pitched my foot against a stone, and were asked how the stone came to be there; I might possibly answer, that, for anything I knew to the contrary, it had lain there forever: nor would it perhaps be very easy to show the absurdity of this answer.&nbsp; But suppose I had found a watch upon the ground, and it should be inquired how the watch happened to be in that place; I should hardly think of the answer I had before given, that for anything I knew, the watch might have always been there. (...) There must have existed, at some time, and at some place or other, an artificer or artificers, who formed [the watch] for the purpose which we find it actually to answer; who comprehended its construction, and designed its use. (...) Every indication of contrivance, every manifestation of design, which existed in the watch, exists in the works of nature; with the difference, on the side of nature, of being greater or more, and that in a degree which exceeds all computation</i>."&nbsp;</li><li>Dembsky and Wells, <u>The Design of Life</u> - page 165: <i>"Often, when an intelligent agent acts, it leaves behind an identifying mark that clearly signals its intelligence.&nbsp; This mark of intelligence is known as specified complexity.&nbsp; Think of specified complexity as a fingerprint or signature that positively identifies that activity of an intelligence.&nbsp; Unlike irreducible complexity, which is a qualitative notion, specified complexity can be quantified and falls within the mathematical theory of probability and information."</i> </li><li>Casey Luskin - <a href="http://www.evolutionnews.org/2013/08/what_is_the_the075281.html" target="_blank">Straw Men Aside, What Is the Theory of Intelligent Design, Really?</a> - "ID is not focused on studying the actual intelligent cause responsible for life, but rather studies natural objects to determine whether they bear an informational signature indicating an intelligent cause. All ID does is infer an intelligent cause behind the origins of life and of the cosmos. It does not seek to determine the nature or identity of that cause."</li><li>Stephen Meyer - <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OJNMJef-gqU" target="_blank">Intelligent Design - Stephen C. Meyer, PhD </a>&nbsp; </li><li>Acute Appendicitis Statistics by Country (<a href="http://www.rightdiagnosis.com/a/acute_appendicitis/stats-country.htm" target="_blank">link</a>).&nbsp; US rates are about 1/400</li><li><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wedge_strategy" target="_blank"><u>Wedge Strategy</u></a> - "<i>Design theory promises to reverse the stifling dominance of the materialist worldview, and to replace it with a science consonant with Christian and theistic convictions.</i>" </li><li><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kitzmiller_v._Dover_Area_School_District" target="_blank">Kitzmiller v. Dover</a></li><li>Judge John E. Jones III - "<i>It is ironic that several of these individuals, who so staunchly and proudly touted their religious convictions in public, would <u><b>time and again lie</b></u> to cover their tracks and disguise the real purpose behind the ID Policy.</i>"</li></ol>AnticitizenXhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05041380277822761284noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9068953745226541087.post-36973349850886398622015-10-02T15:48:00.001-07:002017-03-10T12:16:41.280-08:00What is Truth?<div style="text-align: justify;"><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_jLJczkOU44" target="_blank">Watch the full video here.</a></div><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">If I had to name the single most frustrating aspect of modern, popular debate, it would have to be the openly adversarial nature on which it all appears to operate.&nbsp; Rather than work together on building a better understanding of our world, we instead seem to be more focused on scoring philosophical points against the "opposition."&nbsp; Often times, this might even be by design, like in a courtroom setting where both advocates must dogmatically argue on behalf of their clients’ best interests.&nbsp; The rest of the time, however, it seems to just happen spontaneously---as if no one really knows what the rules are when engaging in this process.&nbsp; That's why so much philosophical debate in this world feels a lot like trying to play a game of chess against an opponent who thinks that this is supposed to be checkers.&nbsp; Without some formal agreement over what truth is and how to recognize the truth when we see it, then there is simply no way to productively engage with opposing points of view.<br /><br />To me, this presents a very strong incentive to just sit down and summarily examine the question of "What is truth?"&nbsp; Fortunately, in the context of philosophical and mathematical logic, there are actually very well-established answers to this question.&nbsp; It's just that you wouldn't really know it because no one ever seems capable of spelling them all out within a single, comprehensive reference.&nbsp; That’s why I feel personally motivated to present my findings on this issue.&nbsp; It’s a perfect opportunity to explicitly lay the foundations of basic epistemology for everyone to see, such that we can finally begin to hold each other accountable to a more rigorous set of philosophical rules.<br /><br />To begin, it's important to understand that any time we talk about a thing like truth, we're <b>not </b>talking about some intrinsic metaphysical quality of reality itself.&nbsp; Technically, what we're really talking about is a property of propositions.&nbsp; That is to say, <b>propositions can either be true or they can be false, but there is no such thing as raw "essence of truth" interwoven into the fabric of space and time.</b>&nbsp; Speaking more formally, a <b>truth value</b> is classically defined as a member of a binary set that contains the elements "True" and "False"&nbsp; [1].&nbsp; The purpose of this set is to serve as a kind of marker for linguistic propositions in order to help us measure their epistemic "correctness."&nbsp; What exactly that means is open to some interpretation, but we can give it a rigorous definition through a mechanism known as a <b>truth assignment</b>.&nbsp; Speaking formally again, a truth assignment (also called a <b>truth valuation</b>, or an <b>interpretation</b>) is defined as a mapping function between the set of simple linguistic propositions and the set of binary truth values.<br /><br />If that sounds a bit technical at first, then just think of it like this:&nbsp; Imagine me writing down a simple proposition on a post-it note and placing it in front of you.&nbsp; In your left hand is a giant rubber stamp that says "true" while in your right hand is a another giant rubber stamp that says "false."&nbsp; Your job is to decide which label deserves to be stamped on this note.&nbsp; So ask yourself, how do you go about doing that?&nbsp; Do you just arbitrarily stamp things randomly?&nbsp; Or do you apply some set of rules that give your labels a more significant meaning?&nbsp; Whatever answer you give to this question is effectively your truth assignment function.&nbsp; It's an algorithm that takes simple linguistic propositions as an input and then determines a binary truth value as the output.<br /><br />Now let's take it one step further.&nbsp; Suppose you've stamped a dozen or so of these post-it notes with truth values, when suddenly you feel like connecting them together into more complex arrangements.&nbsp; For example, maybe you think two true propositions connected left to right should also be stamped with a value of "true."&nbsp; Or maybe you think two false propositions connected top to bottom should always be "false."&nbsp; Maybe you think propositions stamped with "true" on the top should all be stamped with "false" on the bottom, and vice-versa.&nbsp; These are all perfectly valid operations, and represent the role of <b>logical connectives </b>contained within the scope of<b> propositional logic.</b>&nbsp; We like using logical connectives because they allow us to literally "connect" propositions together, thereby creating more interesting <b>propositional formulas.</b><br /><br />Notice also how there's nothing physically forcing us to stick with only a binary set of truth values.&nbsp; For example, maybe you think truth would make more sense if we used a ternary set of values rather than binary.&nbsp; It's a perfectly valid conception that's even used in practice today by scientists, engineers, and mathematicians [2].&nbsp; Some systems of logic even treat truth as a continuum value rather than a discrete set [3], and again find use in modern scientific applications.&nbsp; There is no objectively right or wrong answer except for the collective say-so of human philosophers in our ultimate quest for a meaningful conception of truth.&nbsp; <br /><br /><span style="line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">This is all pretty standard material so far, and can readily be verified in most relevant textbooks on the subject [4,5].&nbsp; However, something you generally won't find is an official stance over the precise nature of an ideal truth assignment.&nbsp; It's as if we're all experts at manipulating truth values once we have them, but no one knows how to go about assigning those actual truth values in the first place.&nbsp; That's a real shame, because this question represents the heart of what an idea like truth is supposed to philosophically encapsulate.&nbsp; At best, we only seem to have this vague notion that truth should, in some way or another, represent a kind of "correspondence" between the set of linguistic propositions and the factual state of affairs in objective reality.&nbsp; True propositions are those which effectively describe the real world as it really is, while false propositions do not.</span><br /><span style="line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span><span style="line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">This is a fairly common epistemic concept that philosophers like to call the <b>correspondence theory of truth</b>.&nbsp; And at first glance, it does seem to be a pretty intuitive definition.&nbsp; Unfortunately, there's also a glaring hole that needs to be addressed.&nbsp; Namely, what exactly is this "correspondence" thing you speak of, and how do I recognize it when I see it?&nbsp; </span><span style="line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">For example, consider a simple proposition like "the Moon is round."&nbsp; Is that true or false?&nbsp; According to correspondence theory, the best we can say is that if the Moon is round, then it is "true" that the Moon is round.&nbsp; Since that's obviously just a vapid tautology, correspondence theory of truth hasn't really told me anything about how to assign truth to propositions.&nbsp;</span><br /><br /><span style="line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">But let's take it even further.&nbsp; What if I stand outside one evening and simply look at the moon directly with my own eyes?&nbsp; That way, if I see a generally roundish object, then I can legitimately say that the Moon is round, right? </span><br /><span style="line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span><span style="line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Well, no.</span><br /><span style="line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span><span style="line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">For example, what if there was some kind of optical illusion brought on by the atmosphere that makes squareish things appear round?&nbsp; Or what if I'm just looking at a giant photograph of the moon, or maybe some elaborate hologram?&nbsp; Maybe it's all just an hallucination brought on by drugs, or perhaps a really vivid, lucid dream.&nbsp; Maybe I'm being tricked by a magical demon, or maybe I'm really just a brain in a vat, plugged into some kind of matrix simulation.&nbsp; I simply do not know, and what's more, <b>I can't know</b>.&nbsp; No amount of reason or evidence can ever allow me to perfectly determine objective reality as it really is.&nbsp; Correspondence theory of truth is therefore useless because it offers no way to differentiate between all of these competing&nbsp; scenarios.&nbsp; So if we're ever going to make any progress in building a viable epistemology, <b>then we need to operate under the basic constraints that nature has given us</b>.</span><br /><br />This is a fundamental philosophical concept known as the <b>egocentric position</b>, or equivalently, the <b>problem of external world skepticism</b>.&nbsp; All it says is that for whatever sensory perception you may be experiencing at any given moment, there are limitless ad hoc explanations for what might be causing it. &nbsp;<span style="line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"><span style="line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Remember that I'm just a sentient agent trapped within my immediate mental awareness.&nbsp; </span>It's not like I can just crawl out of that awareness and directly perceive reality as it really is.&nbsp; And even if I could, how exactly would I correspond linguistic propositions to those objective states?&nbsp; What are the rules I have to follow and how do I apply them?&nbsp; <b>We simply cannot ignore the fundamental barriers that exist between reality, our perceptions of reality, and our linguistic frameworks for describing reality</b>.</span><br /><br />This is the part where many philosophers really begin to butt heads with each other, but there are at least a few general principles that most people do tend to agree on.&nbsp; For example, one theory of truth that has great utility is known as the <span style="line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">principle of <b>mental incorrigibility</b>, or simply <b>empiricism</b>.&nbsp; All this says is that any honest statement of immediate sensory perception is automatically a true proposition.&nbsp; For example, consider a statement like "I feel a pain in my foot".&nbsp; Even if it turns out to be a complete illusion (like an amputee with a bad case of phantom limb syndrome) I still cannot deny the fact that I am definitely experiencing a distinct sensory perception that is unique from many others.&nbsp; It therefore seems perfectly reasonable to just acknowledge our perceptual data for what it is, designate those experiences with linguistic markers, and then assign a basic truth value to such propositions accordingly.&nbsp; </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Another popular method for assigning truth to propositions is the use of <b>axiomatic formalism</b>, or for the sake of this discussion, <b>rationalism</b>.&nbsp; Basically, all this system says is that certain "obvious" propositions, called <b>axioms</b>, deserve a specific truth-value by rote fiat.&nbsp; </span><span style="line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">For example, take the reflexive law of equality: A = A.&nbsp; No one derived this proposition from any prior logical framework, nor was it empirically discovered hiding under some rock.&nbsp; It was just asserted outright as "true" because mathematicians needed a concept of equality from which to build a working system of algebra.&nbsp;&nbsp;</span><br /><br /><span style="line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Once we finally settle on an agreeable set of axioms, it then becomes possible to generate new true propositions out of the old ones by exercising <b>rules of inference</b>.&nbsp; For example, one classic rule of inference is the transitive law of equality</span><span style="line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"><span style="line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">: if A=B and B=C, then A=C.</span>&nbsp; </span><span style="line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"><span style="line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Again, no one derived this rule from any deeper foundations, nor was it empirically discovered.&nbsp; It was just asserted outright as a thing we're allowed to do with the concept of numerical equality.&nbsp; A</span>ny new propositions generated in such a fashion are then called <b>theorems</b>, and represent the core driver behind all propositional and mathematical logic<span style="line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">.</span></span><br /><br /><span style="line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"><span style="line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">This might feel like strangely circular reasoning at first glance, and in all fairness, it kind of is.&nbsp; However, contrary to popular misconceptions, axiomatic systems like math and logic make no effort to describe any objective sense of mind-independent reality.&nbsp; <b>Rather, a far better way to think of such systems is as a kind of highly formalized language</b>.&nbsp; Good axiomatic assertions are therefore not really circular so much as they are <b>definitional</b>.&nbsp; T</span></span><span style="line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"><span style="line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">hat's why all logical and mathematical theorems are said to <b>analytic</b> in nature, because such truths are ultimately derived entirely from the raw meaning we impose on the terms themselves, and not from any direct connection they have to the external world.&nbsp; One could even argue that this makes analytic propositions a kind of formal extension on the incorrigible, since anyone is </span></span><span style="line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"><span style="line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">internally free to define their own personal vocabulary however they like.</span></span><br /><br />But what about the so-called <b>synthetic propositions</b> that actually do attempt to describe objective reality---that is to say, the world "out there" beyond purely mental processes?&nbsp; For example, consider a proposition like "all bachelors are bald" or maybe "all dogs live on Earth."&nbsp; How do I assign truth to propositions in this category?&nbsp; Again, it's not like I can just pop open a can of reality and directly observe the facts of the matter beyond my senses.&nbsp; Nor can I logically derive their truth from any assigned meaning to the words themselves.&nbsp; So what do we do? </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />This is another point where things tend to get very confusing, simply because there are so many oddball truth assignments to choose from and no real official answers to turn to.&nbsp; For example, suppose we decide to assign truth to propositions that reinforce our sense of personal identity or social status. Let's call this <b>egotistical validation</b>.&nbsp; Granted, it might not be a very good system, but it's still a perfectly valid function that operates under well-defined rules.&nbsp; Maybe you've even encountered this system yourself, like in religious or political discussions where personal emotions tend to run very high. <br /><br /><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; text-align: justify;">Another interesting class of synthetic truth assignment is called <b>Biblical inerrancy</b>, and simply says that no true proposition can ever contradict the records contained within the Holy Bible.&nbsp; It's actually a fairly common truth assignment, typically emerging from religious fundamentalist organizations.&nbsp; Truth, in their view, is basically whatever the Bible says.&nbsp; So while it is tempting to criticize the implicit goals contained within such a definition, it is hard to ignore the clear, meaningful distinction it represents.<br /><br />But let's face facts.&nbsp; Those truth assignments are obviously arbitrary and completely unsatisfying because they make no effort to philosophically connect our beliefs with any objective sense of mind-independent reality.&nbsp; Unless we can find a way to overcome the egocentric position imposed on us by nature, then no system of truth assignment will ever have any meaningful sense of merit.&nbsp; That’s why so much of the philosophical debate in our world appears to be so pointless.&nbsp; Most truth assignment functions utilized in practice are either needlessly arbitrary, brazenly self-serving, or deliberately obtuse.<br /><br />To address this problem, I find that it helps to step back and ask ourselves a fundamental question about truth that surprisingly few philosophers ever seem to ask.&nbsp; Namely, <b>why is it so god-damned important to believe in as many "true" propositions as possible while simultaneously rejecting as many of the "false?"</b>&nbsp; What difference does it make at the end of the day?&nbsp; For instance, consider a possible world where everything I believe about the universe just so happens to be categorically false.&nbsp; However, every single time I make a decision based off of those beliefs, the consequences are maximally predictable and desirable for me anyway.&nbsp; Likewise, any time I commit a single "true" belief to action, the outcome is never predictable or desirable for me at all.&nbsp; Now let’s ask ourselves - given such a world, is it even meaningful to call any of my beliefs "false?”&nbsp; And if so,<b> why would I ever want to believe anything that was true?</b>&nbsp; I could spend my entire life being completely wrong about absolutely everything and actually be better off for it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp;</span><br /><br /><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">This simple thought experiment represents the core principle behind a system of truth assignment generally known as <b>pragmatism</b>.&nbsp; All this system has to say is that <b>the only meaningful reason why anyone would ever bother believing anything at all is so that we can eventually use that information as a guide for our actions.</b>&nbsp; Decisions based on “true” beliefs will therefore manifest themselves in the form of controlled, predictable experiences, while decisions based on “false” beliefs will eventually fail in that goal.&nbsp; Any beliefs that refuse to drive any actions whatsoever, even in principle, are thus effectively reduced to useless rhetorical gibberish. </span><br /><br /><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">To illustrate how this system might work in practice, simply imagine yourself standing at a busy intersection when suddenly you decide that you'd like to walk across to the other side.&nbsp; Sure, you can axiomatically declare premises and logically deduce conclusions all you want, but sooner or later you're going to have to translate that information into a real, committed action.&nbsp; So while you may think you're being very clever with all your intellectual presumptions and sophisticated rhetoric, <b>I have yet to encounter a single philosopher who could successfully argue with a speeding bus.</b>&nbsp; Everyone, everywhere, is therefore universally bound to the same pragmatic process in our daily epistemology.&nbsp; We collect empirical data, we formulate it as a rationally descriptive model of objective reality, we exercise a decision accordingly, and then we empirically observe the outcome.&nbsp; If our understanding of traffic behavior is indeed "true," then we can expect to safely cross the street without incident.&nbsp; However, if our model contains flaws or inconsistencies, then it's only a matter of time before we eventually find ourselves getting plowed by oncoming traffic.</span><br /><br /><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">This is what makes pragmatism the only epistemology with any viable sense of “connection” to the external world beyond our senses.&nbsp; Because even if my entire reality is little more than a glorified matrix simulation or demon-spawned hallucination, then even that reality is still objectively real, and apparently operating in accordance with causally predictive patterns.&nbsp; So <b>if</b> on the off-chance that my actions have any influence on the outcome of future events, <b>then </b>I can use those outcomes to gain real information about the rules governing my reality.&nbsp; <b>Beliefs drive actions, actions have consequences, and consequences are objective.</b></span><br /><br />We can give this process a nice, technical-sounding name like <b>pragmatic empirical rationalism</b>, but really, it's all just a glorified way of saying <b>science</b>.&nbsp; Because really, that's all science fundamentally boils down to; a formalized system of gathering empirical data, expressing it within a rational, predictive framework, and then testing those predictions against quantifiable actions and consequences.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>We like basing our beliefs on scientific methods because it ultimately allows us to make real decisions in the real world with real, empirical consequences. &nbsp;<b>Mental incorrigibility and axiomatic formalism are not mere ends unto themselves, but essential tools for the greater purpose of pragmatically navigating the world.&nbsp; </b></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; text-align: justify;">Notice also how the pragmatic framework implicitly captures many other familiar principles of both science and scientific method.&nbsp; For example, consider the principle of <b>fallibilism</b>, which simply states that no synthetic propositional model can ever be assigned a value of "true" with any kind of perfect, universal certainty.&nbsp; At best, <b>we only know what to expect from such models if and when we ever happen to find them</b>.&nbsp; Consequently, all knowledge claims about objective reality must always remain open to possible revision when faced with any newer and better information.&nbsp; Likewise, the principle of <b>falsifiability</b> states that<b> </b>we can indeed be perfectly confident in assigning certain models a value of false.&nbsp; That's because the very definition of a false propositional model is one whose empirical predictions fail to come to pass.&nbsp; Likewise, we can even use pragmatism to quantify the principle of <b>Occam's Razor </b>(also known as the principle of<b> parsimony</b>)<b>: </b>given two propositional models that happen to make perfectly equivalent predictions, then the model containing fewer assumptions is automatically preferable.&nbsp; After all, if both models are empirically equivalent either way, then you might as well just go with the one that takes less work to think about.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; text-align: justify;">But hey, maybe that's being too presumptuous.&nbsp; Maybe you think pragmatism is a terrible principle of truth assignment, and that we should all replace it with some "higher" form of understanding.&nbsp; But let's be clear about what that entails. Without some ultimately pragmatic purpose by which to measure our beliefs, then they are effectively disconnected from any empirically predictive decision we could ever hope to make.&nbsp; <b>I could therefore openly concede every last proposition you have to say about reality, and literally nothing in my life would ever have change as a result</b>.&nbsp; That's why no one cares how many angels can dance on the head of pin.&nbsp; Any answer we give is necessarily going to be trivial and vacuous.&nbsp; We do, however, care a great deal about what medicines work best for treating cancer and why.&nbsp; That's because any decisions we might hope to make on the subject are necessarily dependent on the final answers we give.&nbsp; So unless your truth assignment can somehow facilitate my desire to solve actual problems and reliably predict the outcomes of my actions, then by definition and admission, it is irrelevant and worthless.&nbsp; <b>Pragmatic scientific method therefore is the ultimate measure of all philosophical truth.&nbsp; </b></div><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">NOTES:<br /><br /><ol><li>Usually denoted as {T, F}.</li><li>See tri-state logic</li><li>See fuzzy logic </li><li>Hodel, R. E, "An Introduction to Mathematical Logic," Dover Books (2013)</li><li>Priest, G. "An Introduction to Non-classical Logic," 2nd Ed, Cambridge University Press (2008)</li></ol></div>AnticitizenXhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05041380277822761284noreply@blogger.com35tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9068953745226541087.post-78349930764452442422015-07-24T11:08:00.001-07:002015-07-24T11:09:51.294-07:00The Modal Ontological Argument in a NutshellPremise 1:&nbsp; I define God as a maximally great being.<br /><br />Premise 2:&nbsp; I define maximally great beings as beings that exist necessarily.<br /><br />Conclusion 1:&nbsp; Therefore, I define God as a being that exists necessarily.<br /><br />Premise 3:&nbsp; I define necessary existence as existence in all possible worlds.<br /><br />Conclusion 2:&nbsp; Therefore, I define God as a being that exists in all possible worlds.<br /><br />Premise 4:&nbsp; I define the actual world as an element of the set of all possible worlds.<br /><br />Conclusion 3:&nbsp; Therefore, I define God as a being that exists in the actual world.<br /><br />Premise 5:&nbsp; I define "existence" to mean existence in the actual world.<br /><br />Conclusion 4:&nbsp; Therefore, I define God as a being that exists.<br /><br />Conclusion 5:&nbsp; Therefore, God exists. AnticitizenXhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05041380277822761284noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9068953745226541087.post-79844049999714457272015-07-20T23:03:00.002-07:002015-09-10T15:04:13.151-07:00Idealists Do Not Understand Quantum Mechanics<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">This is a response to Inspiring Philosophy and his fellow cohorts who seem to think that quantum mechanics somehow supports their theistic conception of monistic idealism.&nbsp; However, rather than do a detailed analysis of any particular video, I'm just going to get to the heart of the matter by spelling out the foundational failings behind their entire utilization of quantum mechanics.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Because unlike idealists, <b>I've actually studied quantum mechanics.</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>I've taken college-level courses, both at the undergraduate and graduate level.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>I've utilized quantum mechanics professionally in my career to help design real-world devices.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Hell, I've even published original research utilizing quantum mechanics in peer-reviewed journals.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>So when I speak on quantum mechanics, I want to make it perfectly clear that I am personally speaking as a real-life authority on the subject; maybe not as a distinguished expert, mind you, but at least as someone with a practical, working knowledge in the field.&nbsp; That's why I feel compelled to offer the following summary statement of the entire "quantum idealist" philosophy:</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><i>Dear Inspiring Philosophy, Raatz, and all quantum idealists on YouTube,</i><br /><br /><i>I understand that idealism is important to you and that you must have put a lot of hard work into making your videos.<b> But with all due respect, none of you dumb-asses understand quantum mechanics.</b>&nbsp; There is nothing about quantum mechanics that even remotely supports any of your arguments.&nbsp; It is wholly dishonest of you to pretend to be experts in a field that you obviously have zero formal training in.&nbsp; </i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">Now before you go accusing me of arguing from authority, here is a summary breakdown of everything that's fundamentally wrong with quantum idealism.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><b>Number 1:</b></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The heart and soul of all quantum mechanics is the Schrodinger equation.&nbsp; Real quantum mechanics is accomplished by modeling some potential function into the Schrodinger equation, applying boundary conditions, and then solving for the corresponding eigenvalues and eigenfunctions.&nbsp; Everything we know about the nature of subatomic particles is more-or-less expressible within this framework.&nbsp; Yet quantum idealists make absolutely no effort to express their ideas in the same way.&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Quantum mechanics therefore cannot possibly support idealism because idealists are simply not doing quantum mechanics in any meaningful mathematical capacity.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b>Number 2:</b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Quantum mechanics is philosophically antithetical to the entire idealist sense of epistemology.&nbsp; That's because in order to effectively engage in quantum mechanics, you have to embrace several key principles of logical positivism [1].&nbsp; For example, the analytic/synthetic distinction is a big one, as well as a soft form of verifiability criterion for meaning; principles, I might add, that Christian idealists are all more than happy to reject at almost every opportunity.&nbsp; So once again, quantum mechanics cannot possibly support a single idealist argument because idealists themselves have already decided, in advance, to reject the core epistemic rules that govern it.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><b>Number 3</b>:<br /><br />Quantum idealists constantly argue from authority in place of actual argument.&nbsp; It's so brazen, too, that you can almost make a drinking game out of it.&nbsp; Every time Inspiring Philosophy reaches some critical junction in his presentation, he almost never backs it up himself with any hard data.&nbsp; He just splashes some guy's face on the screen next to a self-supporting assertion; as if we're all supposed to simply take that guy's word as gospel on an otherwise highly controversial subject.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><br /><br />I wouldn't even have that much of a problem with this, either, if he at least just stuck with mainstream scientific authorities, like maybe Stephen Hawking or Sean Carroll.&nbsp; However, several of his most key arguments are supported almost entirely by the abject say-so of completely obscure figures with no authority at all.&nbsp; For example, one name that Inspiring Philosophy loves to drop in his arguments is Henry Stapp.&nbsp; I don't know any nice way to say this, but Henry Stapp is a complete scientific nobody - a "Spirit-Science" hack whose only claim to fame is that he co-writes books with Depok Chopra.&nbsp; The guy has exactly zero technical publications involving any hard, empirical data or rigorous mathematical analysis.&nbsp; Instead, all of his publications are long-winded rhetorical arguments, with the vast majority of them landing in purely philosophical journals and conferences.&nbsp; Inspiring Philosophy is deliberately ignoring the entirety of mainstream quantum mechanics, choosing instead to build his entire case on the absurd ramblings of completely fringe crackpots.<br /><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><b>Number 4:</b><br /><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">The entire idealist argument relies on aspects of quantum mechanics that are known to be unresolved mysteries.&nbsp; For instance, what is the proper physical interpretation of a wave function?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>What constitutes a "measurement?"<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Do particles obey local realism or not?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>These are all actively debated questions in quantum mechanics with no real consensus beyond the standard Copenhagen interpretation.&nbsp; So the moment someone comes along and starts pretending to solve all of these difficult issues, you can assume without hesitation that they're not being honest with you.&nbsp; It's classic God-of-the-Gaps reasoning wherein some current hole in our scientific understanding of the universe inevitably serves as a breeding ground for supernatural explanations.&nbsp; There are reasons why scientists aren't jumping to accept idealism as a new theory of quantum mechanics, chief among which is...<br /><br /><b>Number 5:</b></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">Idealists deliberately avoid making any hard, falsifiable predictions.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Instead, all they do is accommodate.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; They</span>'re all more than happy to take prior existing data and then shove it into their preexisting paradigm, but never do they make any effort to predict a single piece of hard, empirical data that we didn't already know.<br /><br /><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">Even when they're actively trying to make predictions, they still completely fail.&nbsp; For example, I once placed this exact challenge to Inspiring Philosophy, and his only response was that if idealism is true, then the universe is a hologram.&nbsp; </span><br /><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"><br /></span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">Now that might sound impressive to layman, but Inspiring Philosophy doesn't seem to understand that people like me actually study this stuff for a living.&nbsp; So let's just break this down, shall we?</span><br /><br /><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">For starters, it's pretty safe to assume that Inspiring Philosophy has no clue what a "hologram" is in any technical sense.&nbsp; There's a lot of mathematical baggage that comes with a claim like that, and IP certainly hasn't been formally trained in any of it.&nbsp; Instead, it sounds more like he just picked it up from a bunch of spirit-science websites, and thought it sounded cool. </span><br /><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"><br /></span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">Second, his "prediction" isn't really a prediction at all, because he didn't make it.&nbsp; Professional cosmologists and string theorists are the ones talking about the potential for a holographic universe, and Inspiring Philosophy is apparently just riding on their coattails.&nbsp; Again, that's not a prediction but accommodation.</span><br /><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"><br /></span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">Third, nothing about quantum idealism has any logical connection to holography, whatsoever.&nbsp; Just ask yourself, h<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">ow does the assumption of an immaterial mind-essence behind all of reality lead us to a universe where magnitude and phase information encode a three-dimensional geometry onto a two dimensional surface?&nbsp; Where is the mathematical derivation of this principle?&nbsp; Obviously, there isn't any, because Inspiring Philosophy has no clue what he's talking about. </span></span><br /><br /><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">Fourth, how do I measure "holograph-ness" of the universe?&nbsp; Where do I point my telescope, and what empirical data am I trying to observe?&nbsp; What is the predicted power spectral density of the cosmic microwave background?&nbsp; How much red shift will type-1A supernovas produce and at what distance?&nbsp; Those are the types of questions that have meaning for empirical predictions, and not some vague allusions to techno-sounding jargon.&nbsp; </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />But hey, maybe I'm being too harsh.&nbsp; Maybe there really is something to this whole "souls cause wavefunctions to collapse" thing.&nbsp; So here's a challenge for all you quantum idealists out there.&nbsp; Why don't you put your money where your mouth is and submit your findings to an actual scientific journal?&nbsp; Not some hack philosophical forum or "Spirit Science" conference, but an actual, technical journal reviewed by experts in the field.&nbsp; I know that I've personally had no trouble publishing findings of my own in those exact same journals, so what's stopping you?<br /><br />Honestly, guys.&nbsp; Who's kidding who, here? &nbsp;Quantum mechanics is notoriously difficult stuff, and it takes years of training in mathematics and physics just to scratch the surface.&nbsp; That's why it's so easy to spot a bunch of idiot fakers like yourselves, because you obviously have no formal understanding of the subject.&nbsp; Unfortunately, that's also why it's so easy to just pretend to be an expert anyway, because none of your fan base has the slightest shred of education in partial differential equations, linear system theory, or stochastic processes.&nbsp; Everything about your "quantum-idealism" argument is therefore only convincing to an audience that doesn't know any better.<br />Thanks for reading.<br /><br />Notes:<br /><div style="text-align: justify;"><ol><li>"<i>This philosophical approach of dealing only with questions that can be answered by measurement (or that are purely logical questions within some formal system of logic) and regarding all other questions as meaningless is essentially what is known in the philosophical world as “logical positivism.” <b>It is the most </b></i><span class="textexposedshow"><i><b>common approach taken in dealing with quantum mechanics</b>, at least at the elementary philosophical level…</i>"</span>&nbsp; - David Miller, "Quantum Mechanics for Scientists and Engineers," page 7﻿</li></ol></div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div>AnticitizenXhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05041380277822761284noreply@blogger.com14tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9068953745226541087.post-75282797277208516172015-06-09T08:50:00.002-07:002015-07-23T08:49:00.775-07:00What the Hell is "Free Will?"<div style="text-align: justify;"><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:WordDocument> <w:View>Normal</w:View> <w:Zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:TrackMoves/> <w:TrackFormatting/> <w:PunctuationKerning/> <w:ValidateAgainstSchemas/> <w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:IgnoreMixedContent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:DoNotPromoteQF/> <w:LidThemeOther>EN-US</w:LidThemeOther> <w:LidThemeAsian>X-NONE</w:LidThemeAsian> <w:LidThemeComplexScript>X-NONE</w:LidThemeComplexScript> <w:Compatibility> <w:BreakWrappedTables/> <w:SnapToGridInCell/> <w:WrapTextWithPunct/> <w:UseAsianBreakRules/> <w:DontGrowAutofit/> <w:SplitPgBreakAndParaMark/> <w:DontVertAlignCellWithSp/> 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table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;} </style><![endif]--> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />I've been seeing a lot of talk about free will lately, and I have to confess that I honestly don't know what that term is supposed to mean.&nbsp; It's as if we all have intuitive "gut sense" of what free will is supposed to be, but then it always breaks down whenever we try and give it a hard definition.&nbsp; <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">Now I honestly want to know what free will is, and how to recognize a free agent if and when I should ever encounter one, but for some reason, nobody ever seems to give me a straight definition.&nbsp; So t</span>o help cut through the ambiguity, I'd like to offer a simple philosophical challenge to everyone out there who sincerely believes in free will.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; It goes like this:</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">Imagine yourself in a room, sitting at a table.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Across from you are what appear to be two identical twins.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>They look the same, they act the same, and in all physical respects, they are as alike as two people can possibly be.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>However, there is one key distinction that exists between them: <b>one of them has free will, while the other one does not.</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>For example, maybe one of them had a brain aneurism that robbed him of the free will center in his brain.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Or maybe one of them is a kind of artificial organism, created in a lab, and programmed to look and act like a person in every superficial way, but without the "free will" part - that sort of thing.&nbsp; Your only job is to tell me which is which.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Which one has free will and which one does not?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">If that sounds a little unfair, then let's make it easy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>I'll grant you access to any measurement equipment you like.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>If you need a functional magnetic resonance imager, then fine.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>You can have one.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; If you need to dissect their brain, then go right ahead.&nbsp; </span>Or if you need a mass spectrometer, then that's great too.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Anything you like, just so long as it is at least possible to access in principle.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>For instance, time machines are obviously not an option because they they simply don't exist, and almost certainly never will.&nbsp; I also cannot accept an answer involving other immeasurable, supernatural forces, like "the one with the soul has free will."&nbsp; Otherwise, we'd just have to repeat the entire experiment over again to figure out what a "soul" is.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; So unless you're prepared to go down that road, then just stick to the question at hand -<b> </b></span><b>what set of empirical data would you need in order to objectively measure the difference between a thing that has free will and a thing that doesn't?</b></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">Now I've gotta tell you, I've posed this problem before, and it is like pulling teeth to get a straight answer out people, especially when it comes to Christians.&nbsp; For example, one very common response I've encountered is the idea that free will is somehow "immaterial," and therefore cannot be empirically quantified.&nbsp; And that's fine if you want to think that, but it's also an open admission that free will effectively has no meaning. You've basically just told me that there is literally no way to differentiate between things that have free will and things that don't.&nbsp; I could claim that rocks have free will, or that Canadians don't, and there would be no way to prove either of those assertions false.<br /><br />Then on the rare occasions when I do find people willing to offer a coherent definition, they almost always refuse to follow it consistently.&nbsp; For example, most common definitions of free will tend to involve things like "the ability to choose between different possible courses of action without coercion," or maybe something similar; which is again fine, until you realize that computer programs are also perfectly capable of meeting that exact same criterion.&nbsp; Or maybe if not today, then soon, because it's really only a matter of time before artificial intelligences begin to mimic the cognitive capacity of human beings.&nbsp; Yet once you start going down that road, most people will immediately begin to back pedal, saying that robots are just collections of transistors and therefore cannot possibly have free will.&nbsp; And that's fine if you want to think that, too, but all it does is bring us back to the original challenge.&nbsp; How do I tell the difference between a thing with free will and a thing without?&nbsp; Why do sophisticated networks of neurons in human brains get to have free will, but not sophisticated networks of silicon transistors?&nbsp; What's the difference?&nbsp; Because again, <b>if you cannot tell me the empirical difference between a thing with free will and a thing without, then there simply is no distinction between those two states.</b>&nbsp; It's just a word that has no tangible referent.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">Thank you for listening, and I look forward to hearing your answers.</div>AnticitizenXhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05041380277822761284noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9068953745226541087.post-48143182777515012932015-01-27T16:59:00.000-08:002016-02-10T14:34:27.549-08:00Model Logic Requires an Analytic/Synthetic Distinction<div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Something you may have noticed about Christian apologists is their constant abuse of modal logic.&nbsp; You see this a lot with ideas like the modal ontological argument or in the concept of a "necessary" being.&nbsp; It's ironic, because often times those very same Christians are more than happy to reject the existence of an analytic/synthetic distinction.&nbsp; The very idea of modal logic itself is already an implicit formalism for the analytic/synthetic distinction.&nbsp; They're trying to have their cake and eat it, too.<br /><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div>To illustrate, just look at what modal logic does.&nbsp; When you really get down to the nuts and bolts of it all, modal logic is nothing more than a formalized system for talking about two distinct categories of proposition:</div><ol style="text-align: justify;"><li>Possible</li><li>Necessary</li></ol><div style="text-align: justify;">When we speak of modal possibility, we are specifically talking about hypothetical descriptions of ways the world <b><i>might have been</i></b>.&nbsp; For example, we might describe a "possible world" where Mitt Romney won the presidential election instead of Barack Obama.&nbsp; Obviously, we don't actually live in that world, but there is no real reason we <b><i>could not</i></b> have.&nbsp; It is simply a happenstance of natural events that we find ourselves in a world where Barack Obama is the president.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">In contrast with modal possibility, we also have the idea of modal <i>necessity</i>.&nbsp; These are propositions that must be true or false in all possible worlds.&nbsp; For example, there does not exist a single possible world where Barack Obama both won and lost the 2012 presidential elections.&nbsp; The reason is because losing is logically equivalent to "not winning."&nbsp; So to both win and lose an election is to both "win and not win," which is a logical contradiction.&nbsp; Since all contradictions are tautologically false, it is impossible to describe a coherent, hypothetical world where this ever happens.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Now compare these ideas with principles of an analytic/synthetic distinction.&nbsp; For example, analytic propositions are those whose truth is evaluated purely on the basis of axioms, definitions, and logical rules of inference.&nbsp; So when presented with a proposition like,</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">"Barack Obama both won and lost the 2012 election ..."</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">... we know immediately that such a proposition is analytically false.&nbsp; The reason is due to the rules built into propositional logic and the tautologies that arise as a result.&nbsp; It is not a statement about objective, mind-independent reality, but about the raw meaning contained within the words themselves and their corresponding logical operators.&nbsp; All "necessary" truths are therefore functionally equivalent to analytic propositions.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Now compare this against a slightly modified proposition:</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">"Barack Obama won the 2012 election."</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Notice how I cannot "derive" the truth of this proposition logically or analytically.&nbsp; For all I know, the truth assignment to this could swing either way, and there is nothing immediately wrong with either case.&nbsp; The only way to tell for sure is to investigate the matter empirically by making falsifiable predictions.&nbsp; Both options are therefore perfectly "possible," with the correct answer based entirely on whatever outcome nature contingently decided to go with.&nbsp; Yet this is exactly what defines a synthetic proposition!&nbsp; Contingent possibility and synthetic propositions are just two sides of the same philosophical coin.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">To me, this is just another one of those great examples of the utter incompetence of Christian apologetics.&nbsp; It is logically impossible to embrace the principles of modal logic without simultaneously acknowledging some facet of the analytic/synthetic distinction.<br /><br /><b>You can't have it both ways, Christians!</b> </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div>AnticitizenXhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05041380277822761284noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9068953745226541087.post-81640828894152632542015-01-15T11:22:00.003-08:002015-08-09T07:34:03.642-07:00There Is No Such Thing as a "Necessary" Being<div style="text-align: justify;"><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <o:OfficeDocumentSettings> <o:RelyOnVML/> <o:AllowPNG/> </o:OfficeDocumentSettings></xml><![endif]--></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:WordDocument> <w:View>Normal</w:View> <w:Zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:TrackMoves/> <w:TrackFormatting/> <w:PunctuationKerning/> <w:ValidateAgainstSchemas/> <w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:IgnoreMixedContent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:DoNotPromoteQF/> <w:LidThemeOther>EN-US</w:LidThemeOther> 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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="37" Name="Bibliography"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="39" QFormat="true" Name="TOC Heading"/> </w:LatentStyles></xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 10]><style> /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;} </style><![endif]--> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">"Anything that exists has an explanation of its existence, either in the necessity of its own nature, or in an external explanation [1]."</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">I don't know where apologists get this naive impression that they understand how logic works, because arguments like this are just a dead giveaway that they really don't.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>When you say that some entity like God "exists by the necessity of His own nature," you're basically saying that the proposition "God exists" is true in all logically possible worlds.&nbsp; That literally, it is logically inconceivable to even describe some potential state of affairs where God's existence is false.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">So right off the bat, this obviously isn't the case, and it's trivially easy to see why.&nbsp; All you have to do is simply say it out loud - "God does not exist."&nbsp; Or equivalently, you could say something like, "imagine a possible world where God does not exist."&nbsp; Now ask yourself, do you see any logical contradictions in that claim?&nbsp; Because I sure don't.&nbsp; There is nothing immediately incoherent about the prospect of God's nonexistence, which is why any argument to the contrary is necessarily going to fail.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />It's important to understand that whenever we talk about a thing like logic, we're not talking about some intrinsic metaphysical essence of the universe.&nbsp; Rather, what we're really talking about is a system of rules that operates on linguistic propositions.&nbsp; For example, if we accept the proposition that "I live in California," and then follow it up with proposition that "California is a state in America," then we could say that it "necessarily follows" that I live in America.&nbsp; But notice that we only get away with this because the premises already contained the information stated by the conclusion.&nbsp; The only thing that we accomplished through "logic" was to extract that information formally and then state it as an independent proposition unto itself.&nbsp; So to say that a being like God just exists necessarily is to effectively say that the idea of "God" Himself must implicitly carry the property of "existence" within it.&nbsp; That way, the proposition "God does not exist" would become the logical equivalent to saying that " a being which exists does not exist."&nbsp; <br /><br />So, how exactly could anyone go about proving the necessity of God's existence?&nbsp; How does that even work?&nbsp; Well,&nbsp; simple.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>In order for God to qualify as a necessary being, then the proposition "God exists" must either be&nbsp;</div><ol><li>A tautology,&nbsp;</li><li>an axiom, or</li><li>a theorem derived from other axioms using rules of inference.&nbsp;</li></ol><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">That's it.&nbsp; <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"></span>That's the formal definition of a logical proof [2,3], and by extension, logical necessity.&nbsp; Any proposition that does not fit into one of these categories is therefore not a logical necessity, but is rather logically contingent. </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">All right, now let's try it out and see what it be like if God's existence were necessary.&nbsp; Starting with the first option, consider God's existence as if it were a tautologically.&nbsp; Obviously, that can't ever be the case because no simple proposition can even qualify as such; only generic propositional formulas.&nbsp; At best, the only tautological thing you can say about God is something like "either God exists or God does not exist."&nbsp; But of course, that's obviously meaningless because the same thing applies to literally anything and everything.&nbsp; Tautologies are therefore not really helpful to God's necessity because they can only tell you about generic instances of propositional formulas.<br /><br />So how about the second option?&nbsp;&nbsp;<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"></span>What would it look like if God's existence were axiomatically true?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; Simple</span>: </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><ol><li>God exists (axiom).</li></ol></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">Done!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>That's seriously all an axiom is - an arbitrary proposition that is deemed to be "obviously true" by pure, human fiat.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>So if God axiomatically exists, then of course God cannot fail to exist in any logically possible world.&nbsp; The proposition "God exists" is always guaranteed to be true in every possible description of reality.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">Now of course, you might have noticed that that's not a terribly compelling argument.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>After all, if Christians get to axiomatically declare God exists, then what prevents me from doing the opposite?&nbsp; For example,<br /><ol><li>God does <b>not</b> exist (axiom).</li></ol></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">Now what, Christians?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Who wins?&nbsp; My axioms or your axioms?<br /><br />The answer is obviously neither.&nbsp; This is why we don't use axioms to arbitrarily declare rote facts about objective reality.&nbsp; Instead, we only use axioms as a starting point of reasoning by defining what certain ideas mean within a formal language structure.&nbsp; We can then follow basic rules of inference to see if any interesting theorems emerge as a result. <br /><br />To illustrate, let's imagine deriving God's existence analytically through the following argument:<br /><ol><li>All maximally great beings are beings that exist necessarily (axiom - definition of MGB)</li><li>God is a maximally great being (axiom&nbsp; - definition of God)</li><li>Therefore, God exists necessarily (syllogism from 1 and 2)</li></ol>There you have it!&nbsp; We just derived God's existence as a logical theorem from prior axioms.&nbsp; But again, you'll notice that this wasn't terribly compelling, either.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; Contrary to popular belief, logical theorems don't really tell you anything more about objective reality any more than axioms do.&nbsp; At best, they can </span>only serve as linguistic tools for mixing and matching the information that was arbitrarily inserted into the wording of the premises.&nbsp; So if you accept the premises, the of course the conclusion "necessarily" follows.&nbsp; However, the premises have only been substantiated by rote definition, and I am under no obligation to accept such a lexicon.&nbsp; <br /><br />So no matter how you look at, the only way for God to exist "by necessity" to effectively declare it outright.&nbsp; That's why nothing in the entire universe can possibly exist out of "the necessity of its own nature" because that very statement literally means "existence by definition."&nbsp; Well I'm sorry, guys, but you can't just arbitrarily define rote facts about objective reality.&nbsp; That's called "question begging."&nbsp; Nothing about the idea of God logically necessitates His own existence unless you just arbitrarily decide to put it there.&nbsp; The only way to break out of this nasty circle of logic is to substantiate your premises through something beyond mere axioms and definitions; for example, basic empirical observation.&nbsp; That's why anyone who ever gets the naive idea that God's existence is some kind of logical necessity is either being deliberately dishonest or is just completely clueless about the most basic principles of logic itself.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">References</div><ol><li><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s2ULF5WixMM" target="_blank">The Leibnizian Cosmological Argument&nbsp;</a> </li><li>See: <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Formal_proof" target="_blank">Formal Proof </a></li><li>See: <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Introduction-Mathematical-Logic-Dover-Mathematics/dp/0486497852" target="_blank">An Introduction to Mathematical Logic</a></li></ol><div style="text-align: justify;"></div>AnticitizenXhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05041380277822761284noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9068953745226541087.post-23038463649506096562015-01-06T09:46:00.005-08:002015-03-26T15:55:10.836-07:00Not Even Christians Believe Their Own Bullshit<div style="text-align: justify;"><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <o:OfficeDocumentSettings> <o:RelyOnVML/> <o:AllowPNG/> </o:OfficeDocumentSettings></xml><![endif]--></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:WordDocument> <w:View>Normal</w:View> <w:Zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:TrackMoves/> <w:TrackFormatting/> <w:PunctuationKerning/> <w:ValidateAgainstSchemas/> <w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:IgnoreMixedContent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:DoNotPromoteQF/> <w:LidThemeOther>EN-US</w:LidThemeOther> <w:LidThemeAsian>X-NONE</w:LidThemeAsian> <w:LidThemeComplexScript>X-NONE</w:LidThemeComplexScript> <w:Compatibility> 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QFormat="true" Name="TOC Heading"/> </w:LatentStyles></xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 10]><style> /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;} </style><![endif]--> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />Something I find terribly aggravating about Christian apologists is the fact that not even Christians themselves actually believe the claims they're making.&nbsp; For example, in the books Mark, Matthew, and Luke, we find a story about a rich man who asks Jesus what he must do in order to inherit eternal life.&nbsp; Jesus answers this question by commanding the rich man to sell all of his worldly possessions and give the money to the poor.&nbsp; The rich man then walks away in sadness, apparently not wanting want to give up his vast material wealth.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Jesus then turns to his disciples and says, flat out, that it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven.&nbsp; He's literally describing an impossible task, then telling the world that "this impossible task is easier to achieve than for a wealthy person to enter the Kingdom of God."</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">This story is interesting to me, because there really isn't a whole lot of room for interpretation.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Jesus himself is unilaterally telling the world that personal wealth is one of the greatest obstacles in existence to achieving salvation.&nbsp; It's even a theme that gets repeated over and over in other passages.&nbsp; The only "true" Christians are those who devote themselves to a life of purely selfless service for the sake of the less fortunate, and the accumulation of material wealth is simply antithetical to that goal.<br /><br />If I were a true-believing Christian living in the First World, I would be absolutely terrified by this revelation.&nbsp; I would be donating my life's savings to charities and selling everything I have.&nbsp; I would actively look for things in my life that were not absolutely essential to survival and just get rid of them.&nbsp; It's therefore very strange to me that Christians almost never attempt to seriously live by this kind of principle.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>If anything, we usually tend to see the exact opposite, with the most prominently outspoken Christian defenders nearly always being the most affluent.&nbsp; The very same Christian conservatives who claim that America was founded on Christian principles are also the same ones who seem to be the most hell-bent on defending the status of rich people in this country.&nbsp; Sure, there's the occasional Christian doctor or something that moves to the third-world and does real, altruistic work, but for every one of those people, there are literally hundreds, if not thousands, who choose to stay at home with their big screen TVs.<br /><br />I've occasionally posed this problem to Christians, and I have yet to see a single apologist ever live up to the expectations of their own faith.&nbsp; Instead, all I ever seem to hear are either tortured rationalizations or absurd reinterpretations of clearly unambiguous doctrine.&nbsp; It's as if they honestly think Jesus will be totally impressed with that fancy new car or that expensive laptop when there are literally billions of people around the world who live in abject poverty.&nbsp; Seriously, guys - you really think Jesus is going to be okay with that?&nbsp; You don't think this will have spiritual consequences for you?</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />I can only imagine the cognitive dissonance this must generate in Christian apologists.&nbsp; On some level, they have to realize how absurdly hypocritical they're being.&nbsp; You cannot claim to be a disciple of Jesus while simultaneously ignoring the central tenet of his entire message. It even says very plainly in the book of Matthew that there will be those who profess to be good Christians, but to whom Jesus is just going to say "I never knew you; depart from me!" [Matthew 7, 27]<br /><br />To me, this is a dead giveaway that not even Christians really believe their own bullshit.&nbsp; Because if I actually believed this stuff, like if I literally believed that my <b>immortal soul</b> was hanging in the balance, then I wouldn't mince words over what Christ maybe meant to say or not say.&nbsp; I would be paranoid as hell about gaining the most altruistic attitude it was physically possible to have.&nbsp; So the simple fact that Christians are obviously not adopting a similar behavior tells me that they can't really believe the things they claim to believe.&nbsp; If actions speak louder then words, then Christians might as well be mutes.<br /><br />But hey, Christians, if you want to gamble your eternal salvation for that steak dinner or shiny new house, then you go right ahead.&nbsp; It'll be a great way for us to measure just how much of a hypocrite you really are.</div>AnticitizenXhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05041380277822761284noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9068953745226541087.post-26485100464090219622014-09-27T19:27:00.002-07:002015-02-17T15:49:04.401-08:00Part 8: Historical Jesus<div style="text-align: justify;"><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5UsFnWScv7w" target="_blank">Watch the full video here.</a></div><br />You can tell that Christian apologists are fighting an uphill battle when the very existence of God is already a dubious philosophical proposition unto itself.&nbsp; To illustrate, let's suppose we're feeling generous and immediately decide to grant every last argument put forth by Christians thus far.&nbsp; What exactly would be established?&nbsp; Well, apparently, a powerful, supernatural agent exists somewhere, He has a good knack for conjuring stable universes out of nothing, and He probably has a vested interest in how human beings conduct their personal affairs.&nbsp; That's really about it.&nbsp; It's a pitifully weak form of deism that does absolutely nothing to differentiate Christianity from any other religious tradition.&nbsp; That's why, sooner or later, Christians eventually have to start defending the Bible as a reliable historical account of genuinely supernatural events.&nbsp; And even then, the only thing that fundamentally separates Christianity from the other Abrahamic traditions is the alleged spiritual identity of Jesus Christ.&nbsp; So for all the philosophical posturing and metaphysical presumptions, Christianity either lives or dies on the historical reliability of Christ's ministry and resurrection, as detailed by the New Testament accounts.&nbsp; <br /><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Now before offering any criticism, it’s important to establish what exactly is being claimed here.&nbsp; Remember that the very core of all Christianity itself is the belief that, roughly 2,000 years ago, a half-blooded demigod, born of a virgin woman, was sent to Earth on a cosmic mission to atone for the sins of the entire universe as a form of ritual blood-sacrifice to appease the perfect justice of his omnipotent father/God/self.&nbsp; He healed the sick, raised the dead, walked on water, turned water into wine, and spent his entire adult life preaching a message of divine salvation throughout ancient Judea.&nbsp; Then, three days after being crucified by Roman authorities, he rose from the dead and ascended to heaven in full, celestial glory.<br /><br />That really is the ultimate pill you have to swallow in order to properly call yourself a Christian.&nbsp; However, it's also important to realize that stories like this are rampantly commonplace throughout human history.&nbsp; For example, Apollonius of Tyana, Zoroaster of Persia, Muhammad of Arabia, Siddhārtha Gautama of India and even Joseph Smith of Upstate New York, are just a handful of similar prophetical figures to Jesus of Nazareth.&nbsp; All of them are recorded to have been divinely inspired leaders who taught messages of spiritual salvation and even performed miracles among their communities.&nbsp; So on what basis do Christians pretend to know that the supernatural stories contained in the Bible are legitimate, historical events, as opposed to just another bunch of cultural myths, legends, and fairy tales?<br /><br />This is an important question to ask because the answer itself is almost embarrassing to say out loud.&nbsp; In short, <b>the sum total of all evidence we have for any of the spiritual events described within the Bible is the Bible itself.&nbsp; Literally, the pure, unfettered say-so of human authors</b>; oral traditions that were scribbled down millennia ago by members of highly superstitious, illiterate cultures, teeming with deliberate frauds and religious cults.&nbsp; We're seriously talking about copies of copies (of copies!) that were selectively edited and compiled over multiple centuries by a series of politically-motivated committee decisions, and then translated through multiple languages.&nbsp;<b> That is the ultimate standard of evidence Christians expect us to embrace when determining the historical reality of supernatural events.</b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">So without even getting off the ground, the case for the historical Jesus is already so laughably empty that there's almost no point in even looking at it any further. &nbsp;Nevertheless, the case of the historical Jesus does raise a very profound epistemic question.&nbsp; Namely,<b> how do we know the past?</b>&nbsp; That is to say, on what basis do we measure the "truthiness" of any given proposition about historical events?&nbsp; How do we know that Abraham Lincoln was an actual living person while Sherlock Holmes was not?&nbsp; This is another one of those complex philosophical issues that again sparks all kinds of academic debates to this day.&nbsp; But even so, there are still many well-established guidelines on which every renowned, professional historian necessarily agrees.&nbsp; We can therefore learn a great deal about history and Christianity by applying these very same rules to the Biblical gospels.<br /><br />For example, one of the core guidelines in all historical method says that <b>any given source of historical information may be forged or corrupted</b>.&nbsp; This is simply a fact of life given that huge volumes of historical knowledge are derived almost entirely from written human narratives.&nbsp; And whether we like it or not, human beings have the unfortunate habit of misremembering, mistranslating, exaggerating, hallucinating, omitting, or even plain, outright lying whenever they commit a piece of information to paper.&nbsp; <b>No matter how certain we may feel, there is simply no such thing as "absolute" historical truth.&nbsp; </b>At best, there are only varying degrees of certainty based on empirical data and probabilistic inferences to the best explanation.<br /><br />Now contrast this basic principle with the doctrine of <b>Biblical inerrancy</b> - the belief that the words contained within the Bible were all divinely inspired by God Himself, and are therefore perfectly trustworthy as given.&nbsp; It's another classic attempt by Christianity to sidestep fallabilism altogether and psychologically shield itself against the prospect of being wrong about things – as if we're supposed to just take it all on faith that not a single one of the dozens of Biblical scribes, authors, and editors, was even remotely capable the slightest shred of personal bias, misinterpretation, embellishment, or deliberate fraud.&nbsp; And this is in spite of the fact that we literally have hundreds, if not thousands, of well-documented examples of exactly that sort of thing in early New Testament manuscripts [1].&nbsp; Yet most Christians apparently just don't care.&nbsp; They simply assume, in advance, that everything in the Bible is the inspired word of God Himself, and therefore completely free of error [2,3].<br /><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">Next in our list of historical methods is a simple guideline that says <b>first-hand information is more credible than second-hand, which is more credible than third-hand, and so on</b>.&nbsp; This is simply an application of the famous “telephone” problem [or Chinese Whispers if you’re from the UK], where information is inevitably corrupted as it hops from one individual to another.&nbsp; It's also the reason why nearly all forms of hearsay are utterly inadmissible in any modern court of law - <b>you just can't trust it</b>.&nbsp; So if the Gospel narratives are supposed to be credible, then it should would be awfully nice if they were written by the actual people who were actually there.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">But of course they weren’t, and often times are openly proud of it.&nbsp; For example, <b>absolutely nothing in the New Testament was actually written by Jesus himself</b>, but was instead written by other people who merely claimed to be recording Jesus' words after the fact.&nbsp; Even in the Book of Luke, we find an implicit admission that he didn't actually see any of this stuff for himself, but rather that he's simply compiling second-hand accounts from various anonymous eyewitnesses [4].&nbsp; Then the apostle Paul admits in his own epistles that no one actually told him anything about the Christ narrative, but that he instead received his entire message by pure revelation alone [5].&nbsp; Many events, such as the nativity, occur long before Christ ever met any of his disciples and therefore cannot possibly be eyewitness accounts under any conditions.<br /><br /><b>Even the very authors of the Gospels themselves are completely anonymous </b>[6]<b>,</b>because all we have to go on is religious tradition to tell us who these guys actually were.&nbsp; We don't even have any original copies of the Gospels, but simply scattered fragments of copies (of copies!) written centuries after the fact.&nbsp; We even have multiple competing versions of the Gospels with wild variations in all sorts of crucial details, with nothing more than religious tradition to tell us which are officially "scripture" and which are just fallible human concoction [7].&nbsp; We therefore have no idea how much of the New Testament is a reliable transmission of factual events as opposed to natural historical corruption.</div><br />Moving right along, our next rule in historical method states that <b>the more time that transpires before recording an event, then the less reliable the account becomes</b>.&nbsp; This should be pretty obvious, given that human memory is notorious for omitting, substituting, and even inventing major factual details - a situation that is well-known to get even worse when social pressure is added to the mix [8,9].&nbsp; <b>Hell, why do you think human beings even bother writing stuff down in the first place?</b>&nbsp; Memories unavoidably change over time, which is why the sooner a narrative gets recorded, the more reliable it becomes, while the later a narrative gets recorded, the more natural corruption there will inevitably tend to be.&nbsp; So if the Gospel writings are going to have any validity to them at all, then the least we should expect is for them to be contemporary with the actual events as they transpired. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Sadly, this is not at all the case.&nbsp; For example, consider the Gospel of Mark, which scholars generally agree is the earliest official record of the Christ narrative.&nbsp; No one actually knows exactly when this document first appeared, but there is at least a general consensus among scholars that it could not have been recorded any earlier than<b> 30 years after the death of Christ</b> [6].&nbsp; <b>That means multiple decades of raw, unrestricted word-of-mouth compilations before we even get our very first official Gospel!</b>&nbsp; And that's our absolute best case available, because the other three Gospels were all definitely written even more decades after that.&nbsp; Compound this with the obvious political and social bias inherent to any religiously-motivated allegation, not to mention the superstitious, illiterate culture from which it grew, and it becomes psychologically inevitable that legendary elements would corrupt the narrative beyond repair.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">At this point, the case for the historical resurrection of Jesus is already decisively settled beyond any rational dispute, yet Christians are amazing when it comes to cramming as much failure into a single argument as they possibly can.&nbsp; For instance, one of the most important rules in all of historical method is the requirement that <b>multiple, independent accounts should all converge onto the same message in order for that information to be credible</b>.&nbsp; This is another obvious rule based on simple probability [10].&nbsp; All it means is that it's far more difficult for several people to collectively misremember an event the same way than it is for only one person.&nbsp; This is how we <i><b>know</b></i> that Abraham Lincoln really was shot in Ford’s Theater on April 14th, 1865.&nbsp; We have genuine eyewitness accounts from the crowd of people in the room as it happened. We have testimonials from the confederate conspirators themselves admitting to the plot and carrying it out.&nbsp; We have the autopsy report from the guy who examined Lincoln’s corpse after the fact.&nbsp; We even have the actual pistol used by Booth himself to fire the shot.&nbsp; It’s a huge variety of independent sources, all cross-confirming each other on each and every detail, with hardly any errors or inconsistencies between them.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Now contrast this with the Gospel accounts, which often borrow so heavily from each other that they cannot even be considered as truly independent narratives.&nbsp; Then in other sections they'll vary wildly in all sorts of crucial details that cannot be corroborated by a single outside source.&nbsp; For example, after Jesus is crucified, the Gospels describe a series of very extraordinary events, including massive earthquakes and even three hours of darkness covering the land [11].&nbsp; You would think that if something like this really happened, then maybe a few local historians might have recorded it, or that maybe the local astronomers would have noticed the sun blotting out for three entire hours, right?&nbsp; But strangely enough, no such records exist, leaving us entirely with the Bible's abject say-so that any of this stuff really happened.&nbsp; But what's even more extravagant is how the <b>Book of Matthew also describes dead people rising from their graves and roaming the streets</b>.&nbsp; Surely, it’s reasonable to expect at least a few locals to mention a sudden zombie apocalypse somewhere in their memoirs, isn’t it?&nbsp; Yet not even the other three gospels are kind enough to confirm or deny any of this stuff, and these are supposed to be reliable narratives of the exact same events&nbsp; [12]!</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">And speaking of zombies, there’s one particular rule in historical method that often gets overlooked, even though it conspicuously stands out above and beyond all others.&nbsp; Namely, <b>any narratives that appear to completely violate the known laws of physics are the least reliable of all</b>.&nbsp; Again, this is hardly a controversial requirement, since, by definition, such violations cannot be reliably demonstrated under any known conditions.&nbsp; In contrast, human accounts across all cultures are notorious for their capacity to imagine wild fantasies in total disregard to physical laws.&nbsp; This is how we know that stories like the <i>Iliad</i> or the <i>Odyssey</i> are totally unreliable in their historicity.&nbsp; They talk at length about all sorts of magical enchantments and superhuman feats, while the Gods of Olympus constantly intervene in the flow of events - things that make no sense from objective historical references, but are perfectly fitting in a mythological story.<br /><br />The exact same thing is true for the New Testament narratives.&nbsp; We’re talking about a guy who was allegedly birthed by a virgin woman, who walked on water, who exorcised demons, and who came back to life after three days of lying dead in a tomb - events which have no physical basis in all human experience!&nbsp; We know that women don't make babies without first having sex.&nbsp; We know that people who stand on water will generally tend to sink.&nbsp; We know that mental diseases are not caused by evil demon possessions.&nbsp; And, most important of all, we know that <b>dead people have a persistent tendency to stay dead</b>.&nbsp; So when confronted with a story about some guy bleeding out on a cross, only to rise again after three entire days, which should we assume is more likely?&nbsp; That the very laws of physics and biology were specially suspended in this one case?&nbsp; Or that, just maybe, somebody is telling an extravagant work of fiction?&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b>Bear in mind that these are not just “my” rules for determining history, but “the” rules</b> - <b>rules that are designed to keep us honest and help us arrive at a functional understanding of objective reality</b>.&nbsp; Violation of any one of these is already sufficient grounds for doubting the reliability of any historical account, but the<b> Biblical narratives fail at each and every one of them without exception</b>.&nbsp; It’s as if the Bible is going out of its way to win the title for “Least Reliable History Ever.”&nbsp; We're talking about anonymous human narratives written decades after the fact by second-hand sources with obvious political and social agendas, and then translated through multiple language barriers.&nbsp; All of them make wild claims about fantastically impossible events, many of which cannot even be corroborated internally, much less externally by objective, independent sources.&nbsp; It's so patently absurd that <b>even if the authors admitted outright to having made it all up as they went along, then it still wouldn't technically make any of it worse off than it already is</b>.&nbsp; Yet the entirety of Christianity itself is predicated on the idea that the pan-galactic uber-deity of the entire cosmos had a direct influence in assembling this record and preserving it to modern day.&nbsp; Information that is supposed to ultimately determine the eternal fate of our very immortal souls, and the absolute best that God can do to relay it to us through hopelessly corrupted accounts from a dubious iron-age cult.<br /><br />This is what makes Christian doctrine absolutely terrifying on a national scale.&nbsp; Because if you want to talk about the historical basis for the Christ narrative, then at best, the only thing we can confidently conclude is that there was <b>probably</b> some popular philosophical Jesus-figure who served as the real-life foundation for an exaggerated messianic legend.&nbsp; He wouldn't be the first example of this kind of phenomenon,&nbsp; and he sure as hell wouldn't be the last.&nbsp; Yet apologists would actually have you believe that these narratives are more than enough evidence to justify the strong assertion that the literal son of God came down to Earth, performed miracles, and died for your sins.&nbsp; They have no respect for very basic rules of honest epistemology, but instead rewrite them altogether into something that can only be described as a direct effort to foster dim-witted conformity.&nbsp; It's as if the entire institution openly relies on the implied assumption that you're nothing but a credulous moron who’ll believe anything simply because a smart guy in fancy suit says so.&nbsp; <b>We’re talking about a belief system where truth itself is literally defined through the compiled scribblings of an ancient, superstitious culture</b>.&nbsp; The very words “I am a Christian” might as well be perfectly synonymous with the words “I am a gullible fool.”&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b>Notes</b></div><ol style="text-align: justify;"><li>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Textual_variants_in_the_New_Testament</li><li>"We believe the Bible to be the word of God, as far as it is translated correctly.&nbsp; We believe the Book of Mormon to be the word of God." - 8th Article of Faith for the LDS church</li><li>"We proclaim the absolute truth and authority of the Bible with boldness." - AIG mission statement</li><li>Luke 1:1-4</li><li>Galatians 1:11-18</li><li>Mack, B. L., "Who Wrote the New Testament?" The Making of the Christian Myth", Harper One, 1996.</li><li>Bart Erhman, "<span id="btAsinTitle">Lost Scriptures: Books that Did Not Make It into the New Testament</span>"&nbsp; </li><li>Loftus, E. F. and Palmer, J. C., "Reconstruction of automobile accidents: and example of the interaction between language and memory," <i>Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior</i>, Vol 13, No 5 (1974)</li><li>Allan, K. and Gabbert, F., "I still think it was a banana; memorable lies and forgettable truths," <i>Acta Psychologica</i>, Vol 127, No 2 (2008)</li><li>For any two events A and B, if A and B are independent, then P(AB) = P(A)P(B).&nbsp; That means P(AB) &lt; P(A) and P(AB) &lt; P(B). </li><li>Matthew, Chapter 27</li><li>Luke and John make no mention of the earthquakes.&nbsp; Only Matthew mentions the dead people rising from the grave.</li></ol><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div>AnticitizenXhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05041380277822761284noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9068953745226541087.post-69396637007070665842014-09-23T09:07:00.002-07:002014-11-08T21:54:44.879-08:00Part 7: Morality Explained<div style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: center;"></div><div style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DDi7_4BcvTg" target="_blank">Watch the full video here.</a></div><br /><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities.</span></i><span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;"> </span><br /><div style="text-align: right;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">- Voltaire </span></div><br />So there I was the other day buying a Slurpee when the cashier asked me for a buck-sixty-nine.&nbsp; Just as I reached into my pocket for some loose change, the most incredible thing happened: <b>I paid him and got on with my life</b>.&nbsp; It’s strange, I know, because the more “natural” course of action is to immediately jump over the counter, gouge out his eyeballs, rape his corpse, and then set the store on fire.&nbsp; Why, it’s almost as if some ethereal cosmic spirit was telepathically commanding me to be nice to people.&nbsp; At least, that’s what Christians would have you believe, since apparently they can't think of any other viable explanations for why I should refrain from lashing out in a violent rage against total strangers.<br /><br />Which brings us to the <b>moral argument for the existence of God</b>.&nbsp; And while there are of course dozens of variations floating around, they all generally share the same basic structure [1]:&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><ol><li>If God does not exist, objective moral values and duties do not exist.</li><li>Objective moral values and duties do exist.</li><li>Therefore, God exists. </li></ol></div><div style="text-align: justify;">This argument is wildly popular among religious apologetics, and was even one of the personal favorites of C. S. Lewis.&nbsp; But what really makes this argument truly special is how utterly depraved and incoherent it is at every last step.&nbsp; Even the wording itself gives away its own amateurish origins, with the very first premise being written as an obtuse contrapositive [2].&nbsp; Yet for all of its obvious failures, arguments like this are very powerful at insulating believers against all reason and evidence to the contrary.&nbsp; Religions work very hard to intertwine themselves with the perception of absolute moral authority, such that giving up one's faith is often seen as the equivalent of giving up all sense of human decency at the same time.&nbsp; Why else would believers consistently view atheists as the least trustworthy minority group in all of America [3]?&nbsp; It's another deliberate psychological ploy designed to manipulate the believers into remaining believers, and not necessarily to build a viable case for God's existence.<br /><br />But what is morality, really?&nbsp; Because for all this talk about morals and values, it's surprisingly rare for anyone to actually break them down into rigorous, coherent terms.&nbsp; So let's begin with the simple observation that <b>the core of all morality is implicitly defined by choice</b>.&nbsp; That's why we only tend to punish people for things they consciously decide to do or not do, and never for things that just happen.&nbsp; But it's also equally important to realize that <b>choice itself has no practical meaning unless one is trying to actualize some desirable outcome</b>.&nbsp; "Good" and "right" choices are those which can reliably produce a specified result, while "bad" and "wrong" choices ultimately fail in that goal.<br /><br />So which goals are specifically "moral" in nature and which ones are not?&nbsp; This is another one of those sticky philosophical issues that sparks all kinds of academic debate to this day.&nbsp; Yet despite all the contention, most people do tend to agree that any coherent concept of seemingly "moral" behavior must revolve around some kind of ultimate, social interaction.&nbsp; Morally "good" choices tend to manifest through desirable, pro-social consequences while morally "evil" choices are those which tend to do the opposite.&nbsp; But no matter what the specifics may be, it's important to always bear in mind that the whole notion of morality itself is utterly meaningless and irrelevant without some form of <b>consequentialism</b> at its foundation.<br /><br />Strangely enough, however, most Christian philosophers actually reject this principle outright, claiming instead that morality is an objective feature of the universe itself, like the law of gravity or the charge of an electron; that even if the entire human race went extinct today, then certain laws of morality would still be absolutely true and universally binding on all sentient beings across the cosmos.&nbsp; It's another one of those tempting philosophical views called <b>moral realism</b>, and while it may appeal to certain naive intuitions, it utterly fails before it even begins.&nbsp; Because to say that anything is morally "good" or "evil," in and of itself, without any reference to goals or consequences, is just incoherent gibberish.<br /><br />For example, just stop ask yourself: what on Earth is an <b>objective moral value</b> supposed to look like?&nbsp; Like if some guy were to say to you that, "human life has objective value," or that "human life is objectively good," what does that even mean?&nbsp; Is "goodness" supposed to be some kind of radiant intensity that just emanates from human beings, simply by the mere virtue of living?&nbsp; Can we quantify this goodness and measure it with moral thermometers?&nbsp;&nbsp; If so, then what's the standard of calibration?&nbsp; Does a cow's life possess objective moral value, as well?&nbsp; Or a squirrel's?&nbsp; How many squirrels does it take to equal the moral value of one human?&nbsp; How the hell are we supposed to empirically verify any of this in any functional capacity?<br /><br />Obviously, we can't.&nbsp; Because any time we say a thing has value or that a thing is good, <b>we're not talking about some intrinsic physical quality of the thing itself</b>.&nbsp; Technically, what we're really saying is that somewhere, somehow, a subjective agent has arbitrarily decided to place value on that thing in the form of a preferential desire with respect to other things.&nbsp; That's why <b>absolutely nothing in the entire universe can possibly have objective moral value because the very idea itself is an oxymoron!</b>&nbsp; It's like trying to ask what the "objective value" is for a dollar - there isn't any!&nbsp; Value does not exist without some value-er to do the value-ing.&nbsp;&nbsp; So to say that human life has value simply means that, if given a choice, subjective agents will tend to behave in such a way as to promote and preserve human well-being over the alternatives.<br /><br />What about the claim that there exist such things as objective moral duties?&nbsp; That is to say, things we "ought" to do and things we "ought not" do.&nbsp; Well, again, to say that anyone ought to do anything is to say that there exists some desirable state of affairs that can be conditionally actualized through specific actions.&nbsp; For example, <u><b>if</b></u> we desire to raise our children into happy, healthy, well-adjusted adults, <u><b>then</b></u> it necessarily follows that we probably ought not torture them in their infancy.&nbsp; However, <u><b>if</b></u> we have no interest whatsoever in promoting the health, happiness, or emotional well-being of children, <u><b>then</b></u> there really is no good reason for us to refrain from torturing babies, now, is there? </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />Notice how there's nothing conceivably objective about any of this, except for the fact that actions have consequences and that people tend to find certain social outcomes more desirable than others.&nbsp; Yet in the view of Christian apologetics, all moral oughts are universally unconditional.&nbsp; It's a vapid, worthless tautology wherein baby torture is simply deemed, as fact, to be "evil" for no other reason than pure, cosmic fiat.&nbsp; But then the only reason why we "ought not" torture babies in the first place is purely because it's "evil" - as if the mere virtue of some arbitrary four-letter label is supposed to illicit immediate and unconditional compliance from our behavior.<br /><br />So once again, we have Christian apologists pushing yet another argument that was already bungled beyond all meaningful comprehension long before it ever even began.&nbsp; But let's suppose we're again feeling generous and decide to immediately grant the entire moral realist philosophy without contention.&nbsp; Can someone please now tell me <b>in what logical universe does any of this imply anything that even remotely resembles the singular deity of classical monotheism?</b>&nbsp; The very first premise of this argument might just as well have said that if apples don't grow on trees, then the moon is an onion.&nbsp; There's simply no logical connection between these two statements.&nbsp; Yet when we listen to Christian apologists, it apparently just goes without saying that the only viable source for objective morality is the express dictate of a powerful supernatural agent.&nbsp; It's an absurdly authoritarian view known as <b>divine command theory</b>, wherein the ultimate measure of all good and evil in the entire universe is derived solely from the abject say-so of an invisible pan-galactic sky fairy.&nbsp; Literally, objective moral values and duties defined entirely by the whims and properties of a subjective agent!<br /><br />So not only is the moral argument for God's existence completely incoherent and self-defeating from the very start, but also blatantly circular.&nbsp; After all, let's not forget that the whole point of the moral argument in the first place is to prove God's existence.&nbsp; <b>Except you can't do that when morality itself has already been predefined by the implied assumption of God's existence!</b>&nbsp; It's like trying to argue that Elvis' car proves the existence of Elvis.&nbsp; The very phrase "Elvis' car" has no objective meaning until after we've established the existence of Elvis; not before [4].&nbsp; It's another textbook example of classic logical question begging, and again, self-proclaimed “experts” in philosophy continually fail to recognize it to this very day.<br /><br />But even ignoring all of that, the one thing that makes this argument such a truly spectacular failure is the fact that Christians are specifically trying to prove the existence of Yahweh, the God of the Bible - the very same god that has openly and proudly endorsed some of the most unspeakable moral atrocities we can possibly imagine.&nbsp; We’re talking about a God that actively encourages:</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><ol><li>Slavery (Exodus 21:20-21, Colossians 3:22, Ephesians 6:5) </li><li>Blood sacrifice (Genesis 8:20)</li><li>Human sacrifice (Genesis 22:1-18, Exodus 32:27)</li><li>Misogyny (Genesis 3:16, Exodus 21:7-8, Corinthians 11:8-9)</li><li>Genital Mutilation (Genesis 17:10-14, 1 Samuel 18:27)</li><li>Genocide (Genesis 6-9, Numbers 21:3, Numbers 21:33-35, Deuteronomy 2:33-34, Joshua 6:21-27, Joshua 10)</li><li>Infanticide (1 Samuel 15:3, Exodus 11-12)</li><li>Thought crimes (Matthew 5:27-28)</li><li>Rape (Deuteronomy 22:28-29)</li><li>and death penalties for trivial offences! (Exodus 35:2, Numbers, 15:32-36, 2 Samuel 6:6-7, 1 Kings 13:15-24, 2 kings 2:23) </li></ol>The very idea that the Biblical God is supposed to serve as the ultimate standard of moral goodness is patently ludicrous.&nbsp; It practically gives a free-license to engage in the most destructive, antisocial behaviors in human history.&nbsp; Or is it really just a coincidence that slave-holding Christians from the American South would habitually appeal to the Bible itself as moral justification for the practice? [5,6,7]<br /><br />But who knows?&nbsp; Maybe the Christians are right.&nbsp; So let's again be generous and immediately grant the entire moral argument without contention.&nbsp; Now what?&nbsp; What changes?&nbsp; Because if God really is the source of all human morality, then how exactly are we supposed verify any specific moral claim?&nbsp; After all, <b>it's not as if God has ever come out and actually told anyone that torturing babies is bad</b>, so how do Christians even pretend to know that this is true in the first place?&nbsp; For all we know, maybe God absolutely loves it when people torture babies, and we're all dangerously behind on our quotas.&nbsp; It's perfectly consistent with all of His other atrocities littered throughout the Bible, so what objective empirical evidence can anyone possibly hope to offer that would indicate otherwise on God's behalf?<br /><br />Or heck, even if God really did come out and issue us direct verbal commands, so what?&nbsp; What objectively binding incentive do I have to comply with such a standard and not some other standard of my own choosing?&nbsp; What's to stop me from simply telling God Himself to "eat shit and die," while I go out and torture babies anyway?&nbsp; Because even if the Biblical God indeed turned out to be real, the only physical effect he could possibly have on any of my choices is to artificially skew their costs and payoffs after the fact.&nbsp; What other purpose do heaven and hell possibly serve, except as a glorified carrot and stick? - Literally, rewards and punishments designed to influence my choices now by skewing their implied consequences later.&nbsp; <b>The very core of nearly all monotheistic doctrine is an open admission that consequentialism really is the ultimate driver of all human moral behavior.</b>&nbsp; And not just pro-social, altruistic consequences, either, but brutal, unfettered self-interest.<br /><br />Interestingly enough, that's exactly the same assumption used by behavioral scientists when formulating a naturalistic theory of moral behavior in biological organisms.&nbsp; Because it's a demonstrable fact that self-interest, when coupled with social interdependence, can, and does, give rise to virtually every form of apparently "nice" behavior observed in nature.&nbsp; Life is not always a zero-sum game, where individual success can only be achieved at the expense of another.&nbsp; Rather, cooperation among organisms very often has a tangibly positive impact on all parties involved, thereby increasing individual well-being and eventual reproductive success.&nbsp; <b>Virtue really can be its own reward.</b><br /><br />This is not just some passing philosophical assertion, either, but a rich scientific field complete with its own empirical data and quantifiable mathematical framework [8,9].&nbsp; Biologists, anthropologists, and economists all independently figured this stuff out decades ago and have long-since converged on a perfectly viable, pragmatic theory of biological cooperation.&nbsp; <b>Morality is not some magical essence of human decision-making, but simply an emergent property of interdependent social dynamics.</b>&nbsp; So to try and explain human morality through the God of the Bible is exactly like trying to invoke Thor, the God of Thunder, to explain the weather.&nbsp; It's a God-of-the-Gaps argument that doesn't even have any gaps!</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />It's ironic that Christians have such a hard time with this kind of natural morality when you realize that the vast majority of American Christians are also gung-ho, laissez-faire capitalists - an economic system, mind you, grounded on the principle assumption that all human beings are fundamentally self-interested!&nbsp; The very essence of a free-market economy is the fact that self-interested individuals have perfectly rational incentives to cooperate and specialize for the betterment of the entire social structure.&nbsp; It’s a spectacular feat of doublethink where Christians simultaneously embrace and reject the exact same principle for no other reason than religious context.<br /><br /><b>It's important to understand that biology simply doesn't give a damn about naive labels like "good" and "evil."</b>&nbsp; Whatever behaviors your parents and grandparents statistically chose to engage in, those same behaviors must have facilitated their ultimate survival and reproduction - because if they didn't, then by definition, <b>you wouldn't be here to think about it</b>.&nbsp; Likewise, your own actions must inevitably serve that very same goal, or else, by definition, you won't have any children or grandchildren to think about it, either.&nbsp; So if our collective behaviors happen to include a general propensity for being nice to each other and getting along, then those too must, in some way or another, serve to improve our statistical reproductive success. Natural selection simply cannot have it any other way.<br /><br />Notice how nothing about this principle requires the emergence of some homogenized moral perfection, but instead predicts exactly what we observe in human cultural groups today - a huge variety of nuanced, moral frameworks, each adapting individually to their respective cultural niches and continually diversifying with respect to geography and time.&nbsp; Yet for all of our variation in cultural norms and values, it's easy to see how certain universal principles might still apply to all groups at all times.&nbsp; For example, <b>under no conceivable circumstances will eating babies ever promote the long-term survival and reproduction of any cultural group.</b>&nbsp; It has nothing to do with some mystical, transcendent essence of the cosmos, but the simple fact that any group which behaves in this way must inevitably go extinct.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />This is why we get to call the fascist Nazis "bad" and peaceful egalitarians "good."&nbsp; Because <u><b>if</b></u> our desire is to live in a happy, safe, productive society (which most of us generally do), <u><b>then</b></u> it is an objective fact that violently antagonizing our neighbors is counterproductive to that goal.&nbsp; However, <u><b>if</b></u> we have no desire whatsoever to form peaceful, cooperative, and mutually beneficial relationships with those around us, <u><b>then</b></u> there really is no good reason to refrain from rampant genocidal aggression, is there?&nbsp; Just don't act surprised when vast, national-scale resources that could have been spent improving infrastructure and funding innovations must instead be spent fighting off people who want to annihilate our culture.&nbsp;&nbsp; <br /><br />Remember that the moral argument for the existence of God is supposed to be another one of those sophisticated go-to arguments, grounded in rock-solid logic, and refined over centuries of academic exchange.&nbsp; Yet the whole thing is so hopelessly bungled at every conceivable step that<b> I can only describe it as pathologically deranged</b>.&nbsp; It again offers no empirical predictions, it makes baseless assertions, it uses incoherent terminology, it argues in a circle,&nbsp; it contradicts itself internally, it gives no reason to care even if it turns out to be true, it implicitly utilizes the very philosophical principles it seeks to reject, it argues for a moral standard that happily permits slavery and genocide, and it attempts to magically explain a natural phenomenon that is already well-understood by science.&nbsp; The only conceivable reason this monstrosity even exists in the first place is because it serves as an excellent tool for overt psychological manipulation.&nbsp; In order to get otherwise decent, kind-hearted people to commit violent atrocities against their fellow human beings, it generally helps to have a good way of satisfying their conscience.&nbsp; And what better way to do that then to convince them that the ultimate standard of all moral virtue itself wholeheartedly endorses their actions, and will even reward them infinitely for their obedience<i>?</i><br /><br /><b>Notes:</b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><ol><li>William Lane Craig's formulation for the moral argument (<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qiw8GB3cZ5M" target="_blank">link</a>).</li><li>Premise 1 has the form, <i>If not-Q, then not-P</i>, which is called a "contrapositive."&nbsp; This form is needlessly obtuse because it introduces two unnecessary negations.&nbsp; A more efficient expression is simply, <i>If P then Q</i>.&nbsp; Premise 1 should therefore read as: <i>if objective moral values and duties exist, then God exists</i>. </li><li>Gervais, W. M. and Shariff, A. F., and Norenzayan, A., "Do You Believe in Atheists? Distrust Is Central to Anti-Atheist Prejudice," <i>Journal of Personality and Social Psychology</i>, Vol 101, No. 6 (2011)</li><li>Let morality = "God's standard of good and evil."&nbsp; Then premise 2 becomes "God's standard of good and evil exists."&nbsp; This statement has no meaning without first establishing that God exists.&nbsp; Saying that God's standard exists is implicitly stating that God exists as well, which is what we're trying to prove in the first place.</li><li><i>With regard to the assertion that slavery is against the spirit of Christianity, we are ready to admit the general assertion, but deny most positively that there is anything in the Old or New Testament which would go to show that slavery, when once introduced, ought at all events to be abrogated, or that the master commits any offense in holding slaves. The children of Israel themselves were slaveholders and were not condemned for it. All the patriarchs themselves were slaveholders; Abraham had more than three hundred, Isaac had a "great store" of them; and even the patient and meek Job himself had "a very great household." When the children of Israel conquered the land of Canaan, they made one whole tribe "hewers of wood and drawers of water," and they were at that very time under the special guidance of Jehovah; they were permitted expressly to purchase slaves of the heathen and keep them as an inheritance for their posterity; and even the children of Israel might be enslaved for six years.</i> - Thomas Dew (1852)</li><li><i>If domestic slavery had been deemed by Jesus Christ the atrocious crime which it is now represented to be, could it have been passed over without censure? Would the doctrines of salvation have been illustrated by a reference to it, direct and unequivocal?—should we not have been told, not that the rich man, but that the slave-holders, could not enter the kingdom of heaven?</i> - National Intelligencer (3 December, 1819) </li><li><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">I assert most unhesitatingly, that the religion of the south is a mere covering for the most horrid crimes - a justifier of the most appalling barbarity, — a sanctifier of the most hateful frauds, — and a dark shelter under which the darkest, foulest, grossest, and most infernal deeds of slaveholders find the strongest protection.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Were I again to be reduced to the condition of a slave, next to that calamity, I should regard the fact of being the slave of a religious slaveholder, the greatest that could befall me.</i> - Frederick Douglass</li><li>Ridley, M., <i>The Origins of Virtue: Human Instincts and the Evolution of Cooperation</i> (1998)</li><li>Axelrod, R., <i>The Evolution of Cooperation</i> (1984)</li></ol></div>AnticitizenXhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05041380277822761284noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9068953745226541087.post-60368865297739933262014-05-24T15:27:00.001-07:002014-07-07T23:26:27.978-07:00Responding to Objections - Omnipotence<div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;">&nbsp; </span><br /><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;">This is going to be a response to some objections I've been getting about the nature of omnipotence.&nbsp; Specifically, in Part 3 of the Philosophical Failures series, I gave a brief outline of an argument known as the <b>Omnipotence Paradox</b> - the idea that if God can do anything, then can God create a rock so heavy that even God Himself cannot lift it?&nbsp; It's a somewhat facetious argument in its simplicity, but it does make a very serious point.&nbsp; Namely, if the theist is not careful in how exactly God is defined, then disproving God becomes trivially easy.&nbsp; All we have to do is examine the meaning of the words contained within the definition itself.&nbsp; If we happen to find any contradictions, then God immediately disappears in a puff of logic.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">That's the essence of the omnipotence paradox in a nutshell, but some people seem to have a problem with my presentation.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>So what I'm going to do today is respond to YouTube user <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Philosophy Lines</i> (or Phil, for short), who was kind enough to make a <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qeq0cvSmdIY" target="_blank">video critique</a> of my video.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>And if the title of his video is any indication (<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Exposing AnticitizenX's Ignorance of Philosophy</i>), he seems to be under the impression that I'm just some terribly inept hack who doesn't know what he's talking about.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Well, okay, that's fair enough, but if you're going rhetorically hype your criticism to that kind of level, then you'd better have something truly insightful to say.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>So what have you got for us, Phil?</span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><i><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">"The errors he makes in this series are illustrative of the tendency within the New Athiesm to rely on popular writers such as Dawkins, Harris, or Michael Shermer, rather than serious philosophers such as Plantina, Mackie, Oppie, and Smith." - (</span></i></span><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qeq0cvSmdIY&amp;t=7s" target="_blank">0m,7s</a>)</span></span></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">I must confess, I find these kinds of remarks to be incredibly off-putting.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>I have, in fact, read the published work of Alvin Plantinga and William Lane Craig, while I have not read anything by Richard Dawkins or Sam Harris [1].<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>But what's really upsetting is that Phil is basically saying that all of us "New Atheists" are bunch of intellectual boobs incapable of thinking our own thoughts, simply because we read the wrong books.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; In contrast, Phil</span> only reads "serious" philosophy and so therefore Phil gets to have independent thoughts of his own.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Honestly, I don't know what he expects to accomplish with this opener, other than to cheaply imply that his philosophical dick is bigger than mine.</span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">So yeah, that's a little bit disappointing as a starter, but let's grant him this much anyway.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Phil's philosophical penis is amazing, and mine is weak and piddly.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Now what?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Show us what you've got, Mighty Penis Man.&nbsp; </span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><i><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">"In his video, PFOC Part 3, ACX shows that he does not understand the conception of God outlined by modern theists such Swinburn, Craig, and Plantinga.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>I'll quote Swinburn from the existence of God: 'God is Omnipotent - able to do whatever is logically possible.'" (<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qeq0cvSmdIY&amp;t=20s" target="_blank">0m,20s</a>)</span></i></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">Okay, let's just stop right here.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Phil, you've read the title of this video series, yes?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>It's not called "Philosophical Failures of Swineburn, Craig, and Plantinga."<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>It's called "Philosophical Failures of <b>Christian Apologetics</b>."<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>And while I do tend to pick on Craig and Plantinga a great deal, this is still a hugely broad category that extends way beyond your little clique of philosophical favorites.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>And since we are talking about Christianity here, it seems perfectly natural to me that we should use the Bible as the ultimate source of what God is like.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>So let's take a look, shall we?</span></span></div><ol><li><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">B</span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">ut Jesus looked at them and said, “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.”&nbsp;</span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;"></span>(<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">Matthew 19:26)</span></span></span></li><li><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">Jesus looked at them and said, "With man it is impossible, but not with God.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>For all things are possible with God." (</span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;"></span></span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">Mark 10:27)</span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">&nbsp;</span></span></li><li><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">For nothing will be impossible with God.</span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;"></span> (<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">Luke 1:37)</span></span></li><li><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">Behold, I am the Lord, the God of all flesh.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Is anything too hard for me? (</span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">Jeremiah 32:27)</span></span></li><li><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;"></span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">I know that you [God] can do all things, and that no purpose of yours can be thwarted.</span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;"></span> (<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">Job 42:2) </span></span></li></ol><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">There you have it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>According to the Bible, God can do anything.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Not only that, but the Bible is even kind of enough to state this fact with unqualified redundancy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>All things are possible, period.</span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">T</span></span><span style="font-family: &quot;Verdana&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">his is a form of omnipotence called <b>absolute omnipotence</b>, and is perfectly consistent with the traditional framework of Christian theology.&nbsp; Granted, not many modern scholars hold to this view, but that's not really the point.&nbsp; Many lay Christians today and famous philosophers throughout history have traditionally tended to naively interpret omnipotence in this regard, and have always done so precisely because that's exactly what the Bible says.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Hell, the word itself literally means "all potential" in Latin (omni = all, potens = ability, power).</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><span style="font-family: &quot;Verdana&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Now if <b>your </b>conception of omnipotence just so happens to be different, then good for you.&nbsp; It just means whatever argument I'm about to give against omnipotence no longer applies to you, does it?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>But as far I can tell, the only reason people ever backed off on this concept is precisely because of the paradox it entails.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>After all, why bother pointing out the paradox in the first place if nobody actually took it so literally<span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;">?</span></span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: &quot;Verdana&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;">Next, Phil plays my clip of the omnipotence paradox, wherein I ask if God can create a rock so heavy that God Himself cannot lift it.&nbsp; But remember, the only real point of this question is to show that inconsistency is an automatic deal-breaker for anyone who wants to argue God's existence.&nbsp; So if your conception of God is incoherent, then by default it cannot exist, and we can even prove that fact with 100% logical certainty.&nbsp; Nevertheless, Phil has a response </span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">(<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qeq0cvSmdIY&amp;t=2m13s" target="_blank">2m13s</a>):</span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">"Of course, this is a strawman of the theist, who does not claim that omnipotence is the ability to do everything, including the logically impossible.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>It's logically impossible to move an immovable object, so God's inability to do so does not violate His omnipotence, correctly defined as the ability to do anything logically possible."</span></i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;"> </span></span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">Excuse me?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Did you say "correctly defined?"</span></span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">Phil, you're an educated philosopher, right?&nbsp; I mean, for crying out loud, you have the word "Philosophy" right there in your screen name, and a picture of John Mackie as your avatar to boot.&nbsp; So obviously you seem to fancy yourself an aficionado of philosophical thinking, and have at least some kind of formal training in this stuff, correct?&nbsp; It therefore follows that you, of all people, should know that there is no such thing as a “correct” definition.&nbsp; At best, we can only say that there are “good” definitions and “bad” definitions.&nbsp; Some definitions are concrete, meaningful, and precise, while other definitions are incoherent and self-defeating.&nbsp; Some definitions tend to accord with the general, public understanding of a term, while other definitions tend to be more technical, contextual, or obscure.&nbsp; But just because I didn't use your preferred definition of omnipotence, that does not absolve you from the fact that my definition is still perfectly consistent with plenty of naively common Christian conceptions about omnipotence.&nbsp; I never claimed that my definition was the <b>only </b>definition, or even that it was the modern, academic definition - only that it was a <b>usual</b> definition (i.e., common; though perhaps a better word would have been "naive").</span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">&nbsp;</span></span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">Honestly, Phil, have you even so much as read the Wikipedia entry on <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omnipotence" target="_blank">omnipotence</a>?&nbsp; There's at least a half-dozen definitions for omnipotence right there, and surely plenty more scattered throughout the literature.&nbsp; Your definition is simply not the only one there is.&nbsp; For example, Rene Descartes believed that God was not limited by logic, but could in fact do the logically impossible.&nbsp; St Augustine of Hippo believed that God was capable of "doing what he wills."&nbsp; Does this mean Rene Descartes and St. Augustine were not "serious philosophers" in your view?</span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">This really is the only serious objection Phil presents in his critique.&nbsp; My definition of omnipotence, being the historically naive definition inherent to the root meaning of the word itself, is not <b>his preferred</b> definition, so therefore I'm a philosophical ignoramus speaking nonsense.&nbsp; Thank goodness we have Philosophy Lines to expose my academic buffoonery to the world!</span></span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">The sad irony in all this is that we can, in fact, use Phil's own definition of omnipotence and still arrive at the same fundamental problems.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; For example, if I really wanted to nit-pick, I could point out that the phrase "logically possible" doesn't technically mean anything.&nbsp; "Logic" is not some binding, universal essence of the cosmos, but just a word we use for any arbitrary axiomatic framework that governs the assignment of&nbsp;truth values to propositions.&nbsp; So which logical system are we supposed to appeal to, Phil?&nbsp; Classical Aristotelian logic?&nbsp; Tri-state logic?&nbsp; Fuzzy logic?&nbsp; Maybe perhaps one of the five different systems of modal logic?</span></span></span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">Now to be fair, what Phil's source probably meant to say is that omnipotence simply means God can do whatever is <b>logically consistent</b>.&nbsp; And that's certainly a step in the right direction, but it's important to understand what this is fundamentally implying.&nbsp; Literally speaking, it means <b>if you can say it, God can do it</b>, just so long as it's intelligible and contains no contradictions.</span>&nbsp; So fine.&nbsp; Let's see how it goes:</span></span></div><ol><li><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;"></span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"></span>God can do all that is logically possible (Phil's definition of God and omnipotence)</span></span></li><li><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;"></span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"></span>It is logically possible to lie (incorrigible fact).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp;&nbsp;</span></span></span></li><li><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"></span>Therefore, God can lie (from 1 and 2).</span></span></li><li><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;"></span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"></span>The Bible says that God cannot lie (Hebrews 6:18, Titus 1:2).</span></span></li><li><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;"></span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"></span>Therefore, the God of the Bible is not omnipotent (from 4 and 1).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></span></li></ol><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">Now what?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Is God omnipotent?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Or is Christianity true?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span></span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">Remember, our focus is on <b>Christian apologetics</b>, so what's it going to be?&nbsp; </span></span></span>You can't have your cake and eat it, too. &nbsp;&nbsp;</span></span></span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;">Or how about this?&nbsp; <b>C</b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;"><b>an God wish a universe into existence?</b>&nbsp; There aren't any immediate contradictions in that statement, but it also doesn't appear to have any logical coherence, either.&nbsp; How exactly does the mere act of speaking an event out loud magically cause that event to manifest itself in reality?&nbsp; There is no causal connection.&nbsp; Yet that's exactly what the Bible says God did "in the beginning."&nbsp; So does "logical possibility" include the principle of non-sequitur or what?</span></span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">But hey, since Phil brought it up anyway, let's forget about Christianity altogether and take it even further:</span></span></div><ol><li><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;"></span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"></span>God can do all that is logically possible (Phil's definition of omnipotence)</span></span></li><li><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">Given any force <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">f</i> and acceleration <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">a</i>, it is logically possible to compile a mass <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">m</i> such that <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">m</i>'s acceleration is less than <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">a</i> (Newton's 2nd Law of Motion).</span></span></li><li><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">Therefore, God can compile a mass to negate any force (from 1 and 2).</span></span></li><li><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">Given any pile of mass <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">m</i>, it is logically possible to produce a force <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">f</i>that will accelerate <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">m</i> beyond <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">a</i> (Newton's 2nd Law of Motion).</span></span></li><li><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">Therefore, God can provide enough force to accelerate any mass (from 1 and 4).</span></span></li></ol><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">Now let's ask the question again: Can God create a rock so heavy that even God Himself cannot lift it?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>No matter what answer you give, either premise (3) or premise (5) must be violated.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; Yet if I were to simply replace "God" with any other finite being we can think of, then the contradiction immediately disappears.&nbsp; </span>It therefore has nothing to do with the question being malformed, but <b>God Himself being ill-defined</b> in premise (1).&nbsp; B</span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">ecause i</span></span></span>n order for God to accelerate any mass, then God must necessarily have the capacity to generate infinite force.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>And in order for God to negate any force, then God must necessarily have the capacity to generate infinite mass.&nbsp; </span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">"Infinity" is not a logically well-behaved concept, and you can't just throw it around willy-nilly without running into these exact kinds of problems.</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">The problem Phil doesn't seem to appreciate is that two things can potentially both be logically possible in isolation, but not necessarily possible when joined together in the same set.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>What this means is that </span><span style="font-size: 12pt;">either</span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;"> God can (a) create immovable objects, </span><span style="font-size: 12pt;">or</span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;"> (b) create unstoppable forces, but not (c) both at once.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span><b>Any attempt to write down an actual list of God's abilities must therefore pick and choose, resulting in a list that is always going to be incomplete.</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>So even with Phil's own definition, we still have the same contradictions as before, because not all "logically possible" potentials are compatible with each other.</span></span><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-4YadEH8fxyg/U4J5pUebjUI/AAAAAAAAAdk/Ejr70JXnEyU/s1600/Things_God_Can_Do.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-4YadEH8fxyg/U4J5pUebjUI/AAAAAAAAAdk/Ejr70JXnEyU/s1600/Things_God_Can_Do.png" height="360" width="640" /></a></div></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">I can't help but point out that if Philosophy Lines had ever read the work of "serious" philosophers like Bertrand Russell, then he would know that the omnipotence paradox is actually just a special case of another well-known dilemma called <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russel%27s_paradox" target="_blank">Russell's paradox</a>.&nbsp; Because when it comes to naive set theory, it happens to be a mathematical fact that any attempt to define a sort of "universal" set must inevitably lead to internal contradictions.&nbsp; That's exactly why omnipotence likewise has so many similar problems, because it tries so hard to treat God as a similar kind of universal set.&nbsp; It simply doesn't work.&nbsp; <b>The set of all logical possibilities is, itself, not a logical possibility!</b><br /><br />So once again, without even leaving my own chair, I can conclusively prove that God does not exist, simply because the very definition being offered is not meaningfully consistent.&nbsp; </span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">But the</span></span> one thing that makes this argument truly pathetic is the simple fact that it's so trivially easy for theists to avoid.&nbsp; </span></span></span></span></span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">All they have to do is <b>stop being so damned greedy in their definition of God</b>, and then the entire objection would immediately vanish without a trace.</span>&nbsp; But no!&nbsp; Theists don't want to worship a merely "finite" deity that's logically consistent, but instead insist on God being infinite in His potentials.<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;"><br />&nbsp;</span></span><br /><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">At this point, most apologists will tend to back-pedal on their definition even further by saying that an omnipotent being can only do things that are logically consistent with its own nature.&nbsp; So for example, God may be omnipotent, but God is also immortal.&nbsp; Therefore God cannot die, because an "immortal mortal" is again a logical contradiction, which God cannot do.&nbsp; Yet even this definition doesn't work because it technically applies to anything and everything.&nbsp; For example, I am mortal.&nbsp; It is in my nature to die someday.&nbsp; I therefore cannot live forever because an "immortal mortal" is again a contradiction.&nbsp; It is not logically consistent with my nature.&nbsp; So to say that an omnipotent being can only do what is "logically consistent with its own nature" is to effectively say that all of us are now omnipotent.&nbsp; It's a tautological assertion that is always true!</span></span><br /><ol><li><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">God is omnipotent.</span></span></li><li><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">Omnipotence = able to do everything that is consistent with one's nature.</span></span></li><li><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">What is God's nature?</span></span></li><li><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">God is omnipotent. </span></span></li></ol><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">I cannot stress enough that the only point of the omnipotence paradox is to remind theists that <b>contradictions are bad</b>.&nbsp; Yet when faced with this brute logical fact, the best they ever seem to do is offer up yet more contradictions and even a vapid tautology to boot.&nbsp; And this is just what happens when we talk about omnipotence alone.&nbsp; What do you think is going to happen when they start adding other "omnis" to the mix, like omniscience and omnibenevolence?&nbsp; Each one of these is bad enough in isolation, so how are they supposed to even remotely get along together in the same logical entity?&nbsp; This is not a trivial problem.&nbsp;&nbsp; The core foundation of all philosophy itself is the rigorous definition of terms.&nbsp; If religious apologists can't even bring themselves to coherently define what this God-thingy of theirs is supposed to be, then it's utterly meaningless to even talk about whether or not it exists.</span></span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">So really, who's "ignorance" is being exposed here, Phil?&nbsp; Have you even remotely thought this thing through?&nbsp; You had one job.<b> &nbsp;</b>Get out a piece of paper, write "omnipotence" at the top, and then enumerate a list of properties we can associate with that word.&nbsp; The rules?&nbsp; Keep it intelligible, and don't resort to any contradictions or recursions.&nbsp; If you can't do this one, simple task, then this is no longer an argument.&nbsp; It's bullshit.&nbsp; </span></span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;"><b>Notes:</b> </span></span><br /><ol><li><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">That's not entirely accurate.&nbsp; I actually did read one of Sam Harris' books, but not until after making PFOC Part 3. So technically, it doesn't count for this discussion.&nbsp; I've also read a couple of Shermer's books, but it's hard to see what anyone could have against them.&nbsp; All Shermer ever does is promote basic science and skepticism, and none of the material I've actually read has anything to do with philosophy of religion. </span></span></li></ol></div>AnticitizenXhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05041380277822761284noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9068953745226541087.post-11349299991319149752012-12-31T21:52:00.003-08:002012-12-31T21:52:51.909-08:00Updated Flow Chart<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-DoJdMwOCZeE/UOJ5laBKaeI/AAAAAAAAALs/GSk3Yg0bBcQ/s1600/Flow+Chart.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="488" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-DoJdMwOCZeE/UOJ5laBKaeI/AAAAAAAAALs/GSk3Yg0bBcQ/s640/Flow+Chart.png" width="640" /></a></div><br />AnticitizenXhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05041380277822761284noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9068953745226541087.post-28287754159235573802012-09-03T21:54:00.001-07:002014-12-04T12:26:11.906-08:00Part 6: Terrible Teleology<div style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: center;"><br /><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qD4eAMrkIlM" target="_blank">Watch the full video here.</a> </div><br />Imagine yourself standing before a firing squad awaiting execution [1].&nbsp; As an officer gives the commands to “ready” and then to “aim,” a squad of highly trained riflemen point their weapons squarely on your chest.&nbsp; A moment of silent anticipation passes before you finally hear the enthusiastic shout to “fire.”&nbsp; You shut your eyes and turn your head just as a deafening roar of gunfire explodes before you.&nbsp; Yet, to your astonishment, you feel no impact and no pain.&nbsp; In fact, once the smoke clears, you even look down to see that you're completely unscathed.&nbsp; What do you make of this?</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />Naturally, there are several possible explanations.&nbsp; For example, maybe someone happened to make the mistake of switching all the regular bullets with blanks.&nbsp; Granted, it’s not a very likely scenario, but it would certainly explain the fact that you're still breathing.&nbsp; It also has the advantage of being testable, since, in principle, you could examine the ammunition for yourself and check for consistency.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />Now let’s suppose you do check the ammo and, sure enough, it’s real.&nbsp; What’s next?&nbsp; Well, maybe your assumption of "highly trained" marksmen is completely wrong, and really they're just a bunch of incompetent boobs who've never fired a weapon in their lives.&nbsp; Again, not very likely, but it does have explanatory power with the potential for testable predictions. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />Okay, so you test their skill and they really are competent soldiers.&nbsp; Now what?&nbsp; Well, maybe the riflemen don't want to be responsible for taking a human life and so they all missed on purpose.&nbsp; Or maybe a gust of wind kicked sand into everyone’s face just as the order was given to “fire.”&nbsp; Or maybe the whole thing is just a vivid, lucid dream, and you still need a few minutes to wake up and come to your senses.&nbsp; There are any number of plausible explanations for the fact that you’re still breathing, and there are well-established rules for testing the veracity of each one.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />Finally, what if someone were to suggest that an invisible, transcendent, disembodied mind happened to personally step in and save you at the last second by telekinetically deflecting all the bullets through his magical force of pure will alone?&nbsp; How likely is <b>that</b> explanation?&nbsp; How would you even test it?&nbsp; Because if you’re a Christian apologist, <b>this is supposed to be the most compelling explanation of them all.</b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />Which brings us to a repeat of the same persistent philosophical failure of Christian apologetics:&nbsp; The idea that scientific failure to properly explain an unlikely event is automatically grounds for invoking the intervention of magic.&nbsp; Only this time, it’s called the <b>teleological argument for the existence of God</b>, and usually sounds like this [2]:</div><ol><li>The fine-tuning of the universe is due to either physical necessity, chance, or design.</li><li>It is not due to physical necessity or chance.</li><li>Therefore, it is due to design.</li></ol><div style="text-align: justify;">And, of course, God is the best explanation for that design, so therefore God must exist. <br /><br />Another one of those big, cosmic mysteries is the problem known as <b>fine-tuning</b>: the idea that the physical constants of nature need to lie within astronomically tight tolerances in order to permit life in our universe.&nbsp; It’s certainly a perplexing puzzle that has a lot of really smart people completely stumped, yet Christians are again jumping in as if they have all the answers to one of the deepest mysteries in modern cosmology.&nbsp; And, being true to form, they offer nothing more to the discussion beyond a tortured train of fallacious logic driven head-on into a preconceived bias.<br /><br />For instance, let's suppose we're feeling generous and decide to immediately grant the entire teleological argument without contention.&nbsp; Now what?&nbsp; How do we follow up with it? What predictive power does it offer?&nbsp; What experimental measurements can we perform to test it?&nbsp; What decisions can I now make in the real world with real, empirical consequences that will manifest under the expectation of a divine, cosmic designer?&nbsp; These are the ultimate arbiters of truth when making synthetic propositions, and not the ability to formulate cute, rhetorical deductions.&nbsp; But of course, apologists have no answers to any of this and will even frequently argue that such challenges are unreasonable to demand of them in the first place!&nbsp; It's a proof by admission that the teleological argument is little more than a glorified philosophical shoe-horn designed to conclude God without demonstrating Him.<br /><br />Remember that Christians are ultimately trying to prove the existence of an entity with virtually unlimited cosmic power - literally the capacity to construct an entire universe, and all the physical laws governing it, according completely arbitrary whims.&nbsp; Yet the very notion of fine-tuning itself implies a being that is fundamentally limited by a strict set of physical laws - a being whose creative potential is restricted solely to the mere tweaking of a small set of constants, scale factors and initial conditions.&nbsp; And even then, the very best that this being can apparently do is construct an overwhelming void of inhospitable nothingness, dotted by the occasional ball of hot plasma and diffuse gas.&nbsp; <b>Life, in the grand scheme of things, is an insignificant cosmic afterthought</b>; a thin film of organic chemistry squished into the surface of a tiny, imperceptible rocky dot, hiding out in some obscure galactic corner.&nbsp; The very idea of a deliberately engineered universe is patently absurd when less than one part in 10^50th of the end product is actually capable of supporting the very thing it was allegedly "designed" for in the first place [3].&nbsp; It would be like a multibillion dollar oil refinery that produces millions of tons of waste every day, but only one functional molecule of gasoline per millennium.&nbsp; The argument itself is an argument for an embarrassingly weak and incompetent deity.<br /><br />It's important to understand that whenever physicists talk about cosmic fine-tuning, it doesn’t just mean for life specifically, but virtually everything else in the entire known universe.&nbsp; One slight tweak on the right fundamental constant and it’s not just life that vanishes, but also stars, galaxies, planets, and sometimes even stable atomic nuclei.&nbsp; The very phrase “finely tuned for life” could just as easily be replaced with the phrase “finely tuned for black holes,” and the entire premise of the teleological argument would still be perfectly valid.&nbsp; In fact, more so, because the universe definitely spends way more time and energy constructing black holes than it does creating actual life.&nbsp; <br /><br />Even worse for apologists is the uncomfortable fact that, piece by piece, the entire fine-tuning premise keeps getting proven wrong.&nbsp; For example, the electroweak scale used to represent a classic case of apparent fine-tuning, since slight deviations in its current value would abruptly halt the fusion of heavy elements in stars [4].&nbsp; However, this premise also relies on the assumption that the electroweak scale is the only parameter that one is allowed to adjust at a given time.&nbsp; If other parameters are allowed to vary simultaneously, then it's actually possible to theoretically demonstrate a whole slew of perfectly functional universes in the total absence of a weak nuclear force [5].<br /><br />Notice how we still have yet to even look at a proper premise of the argument itself, and already the whole thing is hopelessly wrong before it even begins.&nbsp; But let's be good logicians and examine the train of thought anyway, just to see how much of a wreck it really is.&nbsp; And, sure enough, with the very first premise, we see a classic logical fallacy known as the false trichotomy - a blanket assertion that fine-tuning can only be viably explained by one of three exclusive philosophical options.<br /><br />Starting with physical necessity, we have the idea that the universal constants are all the product of some kind of mathematical quirk, like the area of a triangle or the value of pi.&nbsp; For example, Coulomb's law has this strange factor of two contained within the exponent of its reciprocal term.&nbsp; Change this to a factor of say, 3 or 1.5, and all of a sudden atoms themselves have a hard time staying together.&nbsp; However, we also know for a fact that this little factor of 2 is nothing more than an expression of how surface area over a spherical shell is exactly proportional to the square its radius. The so-called "fine-tuning" is really nothing of the sort because basic Euclidean geometry doesn't allow for anything else.<br /><br />Next, we have chance, which is the notion that the universal constants are all little more than random variables distributed uniformly across some arbitrary interval.&nbsp; Then, in an apparent game of cosmic blind darts, our universe just so happened to pick out the one set of life-permitting constants by pure, dumb luck alone.&nbsp; It's actually not as crazy as it sounds, given that nature does this sort of thing all time.&nbsp; For example, consider Earth's fortunate orbit in the narrow habitation zone of our sun.&nbsp; A little too close, and life dies out as the heat eventually boils off all liquid water into the atmosphere.&nbsp; A little too far, and all life abruptly freezes solid due to the withering cold.&nbsp; But so what?&nbsp; There's 300 billion stars in our galaxy alone!&nbsp; With odds like that, it should really come as no surprise at all if there turned out to be millions upon millions of planets landing well within their respective habitable zones.&nbsp; Again, the so-called "fine-tuning" is really just an expression of sheer probability acting over large numbers.&nbsp; <br /><br />Finally, our last option is design, meaning that an unembodied mind beyond space and time used His transdimensional God-magic to specify all of our universal constants directly into the Big Bang singularity.&nbsp; Why would He do that?&nbsp; Who the hell knows?&nbsp; But apparently it has something to do with a need for hot balls of glowing hydrogen to undergo stable nuclear fusion in their cores, thereby forging heavy atomic elements in their death throws and scattering the remains back out into space.&nbsp; To what end, you ask?&nbsp; Because obviously He then needed a tiny fraction of those heavy elements to coalesce back into a miniscule rocky planet capable of facilitating the self-replication of carbon-based molecules, which, after billions of years of inherited allele variations and the occasional mass-extinction event, would finally produce bipedal apes with an ultimate capacity for interdependent social dynamics and personal, spiritual devotion.&nbsp; <br /><br />Isn't it strange how we have plenty of real-world examples of the first two options occurring throughout nature all the time, but absolutely none of the third option to speak of?&nbsp; And why would we?&nbsp; It's a ridiculous Rube-Goldberg monstrosity with no coherent rhyme or reason to it from any engineering perspective.&nbsp; But notice how this argument completely ignores all kinds of potential philosophical alternatives, like maybe a mixture of chance and physical laws working together.&nbsp; For example, one cosmic theory speculates that as a black hole collapses, the result is an entirely new universe popping into existence, complete with its own unique set of physical constants [6].&nbsp; Universes favorable to the creation of black holes therefore also tend to spawn even more universes and even more black holes.&nbsp; Since the conditions for black holes are already necessarily similar to those required for life, then it only makes sense that people like us should eventually appear as a by-product of the whole process [7].<br /><br />Or better yet, who's to say that the universal constants are even constants at all?&nbsp; For example, recent observations into the fine structure constant have indicated a potential variation that spans from one end of the cosmos out to the other [8].&nbsp; So for all we know, maybe nature simply takes on all possible values continuously across space and time.&nbsp; Or heck, maybe fine-tuning really is the product of design, but just not a supernatural design.&nbsp; Honestly, why does "design" have to automatically imply a divine agent rather than a bunch of clever aliens with really cool technology?<br /><br />But who are we kidding?&nbsp; Everyone knows that Christian apologists would rather tear out their own eyeballs than place faith in a transdimensional race of cosmic engineers.&nbsp; So let's stop beating around the bush and just rewrite the first premise for what it is:&nbsp; <b>Either fine-tuning is a deliberate product of the singular deity of classical monotheism, or it's not.</b>&nbsp; That's the real dichotomy contained within this argument, so we might as well take it for what it is.&nbsp; And you know what?&nbsp; There's nothing wrong with that at all!&nbsp; It's a perfectly valid proposition that logically complies with the law of the excluded middle.&nbsp; All Christians need to do now is build a positive empirical case for God that reasonably warrants a rejection of the null hypothesis.&nbsp; <br /><br />You'd think this would be a trivial burden for the apologists to meet, given the sheer arrogant confidence they all seem to have in their shared position.&nbsp; Yet for some strange reason, this is the one philosophical burden they all collectively refuse to ever meet.&nbsp; You can even see it right there in the second premise.&nbsp; Not a shred of effort is spent advancing the God hypothesis, but instead gets devoted entirely to the implied rejection of all naturalistic explanations.<br /><br />For example, we already know that multiverse theories readily explain fine tuning by simply postulating a vast ensemble of random universes, each with their own unique mixture of initial conditions and physical constants.&nbsp; However, the apologist will then rightly point out that such theories are all based entirely on purely theoretical speculations and dubious metaphysical assumptions, without even the slightest shred of empirical evidence backing any of it up.&nbsp; But then, in the very same breath, apologists will immediately assert their own speculative, dubious, and untestable hypothesis as the only viable option now worth accepting - <b>as if the mere virtue of other theories being wrong automatically means some alternative theory gets to be right.&nbsp;</b> It’s like being on trial for murder, and the only evidence the prosecution can offer for your guilt is the mere fact that other people did not actually commit the crime.<br /><br />Let's not forget that in the context of synthetic propositions, it's nearly impossible to ever philosophically prove a negative claim.&nbsp; Even Christians themselves will be the first to remind us all of this fact whenever some atheist dares to suggest how one can know with certainty that God does not exist.&nbsp; Yet here we have one of the top five go-to arguments for the existence of God basing itself entirely on exactly that same fallacy - that absolutely no unguided, naturalistic explanation will ever be able to account for fine-tuning, so therefore God gets to win by default.&nbsp; <br /><br />So when all is said and done, the teleological argument for the existence of God is just that - another argument; words blathered out into the ether without any evidential basis in sense experience or coherent logic.&nbsp; It again offers no testable predictions, it makes ridiculously absurd assumptions, it builds a false trichotomy, it attempts to prove a negative, it ignores precedents, it constraints its own deity, and it hypocritically rejects alternative theories for possessing the very same flaws contained within its own conclusion.&nbsp; The only reason people find it compelling in the first place is because it utilizes the exact same tools of psychological manipulation that we saw earlier with Kalam.&nbsp; Simply begin by exposing the subject to a deep, cosmic mystery, thereby arousing a high sense of need for cognitive closure.&nbsp; This, in turn, makes the subject susceptible to primacy effects, which are then easily satisfied by blanket appeals to agenticity.&nbsp; Once the subject has been indoctrinated with the desired belief, confirmatory observations are then piled on in abundant layers, while any potential falsification via testable empirical predictions is patently rejected out of hand.&nbsp; <b>It's a textbook snake-oil formula statistically guaranteed to engineer conformity with a foregone conclusion.</b><br /><br /><b>Notes:</b></div><ol><li>I call this "The Parable of the Firing Squad."&nbsp; William Lane Craig use this exact same analogy for his argument by falsely comparing it to our universe.&nbsp; Only the way I'm telling it here is how an actual reasonable person would view the situation.</li><li>William Lane Craig - <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_XZb8m7p8ng&amp;t=18m20s" target="_blank">Eastwooding Richard Dawkins</a></li><li>Calculation based on volume.&nbsp; The observable universe is about 10^80 cubic meters in volume.&nbsp; The Earth's biosphere is about 10^17-10^19, depending on how thick you want to make it.&nbsp; The disparity is therefore around 61-63 orders of magnitude.&nbsp; If we wish to be generous, we can allow for a few hundred billion potentially habitable planets throughout the universe and still have 50 orders of magnitude left over to do something else with.</li><li>Jenkins, A. and Perez, G., “<a href="http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/looking-for-life-in-the-multiverse/" target="_blank">Looking for Life in the Multiverse</a>,” Scientific American, January (2010)</li><li>Harnik, R., Kribs, G., and Perez, G. “<a href="http://prd.aps.org/abstract/PRD/v74/i3/e035006" target="_blank">A universe without weak interactions</a>,” Physical Review D, Vol 74, 035006 (2006)</li><li>Pourhasan, R., Afshordi, N., and Mann, R. B., "<a href="http://arxiv.org/abs/1309.1487" target="_blank">Out of the white hole: a holographic origin for the Big Bang</a>," <a href="http://arxiv.org/abs/1309.1487">arXiv:1309.1487</a> [hep-th] </li><li>Smolin, L., "<a href="http://www.amazon.com/Life-Cosmos-Lee-Smolin/dp/0195126645/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1392256799&amp;sr=1-1&amp;keywords=The+Life+of+the+Cosmos" target="_blank">The Life of the Cosmos</a>," Oxford University Press, USA.</li><li>Webb, J. K., et al, "<a href="http://prl.aps.org/abstract/PRL/v107/i19/e191101" target="_blank">Indications of spatial variations in the fine structure constant,</a>" Physical Review Letters, Vol 107, 191101 (2011)</li></ol>AnticitizenXhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05041380277822761284noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9068953745226541087.post-13391690246803711992012-08-29T23:59:00.003-07:002013-11-24T13:37:36.534-08:00Part 5: Cosmological Closure<div style="text-align: justify;"><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sO1DdWeK5XM&amp;" target="_blank">Watch the full video here.</a></div><br /><i>“The argument, if we can dignify it with such a phrase, went something like this:</i></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><i><br />I can’t see a thing on the surface of Venus. Why not? Because it’s covered with a dense layer of clouds. Well, what are clouds made of? Water, of course! Therefore Venus must have an awful lot of water on it.&nbsp; Therefore the surface must be wet. Well, if the surface is wet, then it’s probably a swamp.&nbsp; If there’s a swamp there’s ferns, if there’s ferns, maybe there’s even dinosaurs!<br />Observation: You couldn’t see a thing. Conclusion: Dinosaurs! </i>[1]<i>”</i><br /><br />By far, one of the most common tactics in religious apologetics is to point out some profound gap in human knowledge only so that God can get crammed in as the ideal explanation.&nbsp; And of all the gaps in our scientific understanding of the universe, nothing gets picked on more than the very origins of the universe itself.&nbsp; It's certainly an admitted mystery with a whole army of really smart people working on it at this very moment, yet Christians are more than happy to barge in and pretend like they have all the answers to, literally, everything.<br /><br />Arguments like this are called <b>cosmological arguments</b>, with the most popular by far being the famous <b>Kalam cosmological argument</b>, which generally goes like this [2]:<i> </i></div><ol style="text-align: justify;"><li>Everything that has a beginning of its existence has a cause of its existence.</li><li>The universe has a beginning of its existence.&nbsp; Therefore,</li><li>The universe has a cause of its existence. </li></ol><div style="text-align: justify;">And, of course, God is the best explanation for this cause, so therefore God must exist. </div><ol style="text-align: justify;"></ol><div style="text-align: justify;">While the world is full of critics who just love to shred this argument to bits, they nearly always miss out on the big picture here.<b>&nbsp; </b>Remember that when all is said and done, Christian apologists are trying to prove the existence the Abrahamic God of the Bible.&nbsp; That means an all-powerful and deeply personal cosmic agent with an overwhelmingly vested interest in the affairs of human events; a being that, according to Christians themselves, has unambiguously revealed Himself on numerous occasions throughout history via personal manifestations and national-scale suspension of the laws of physics.&nbsp; We're talking about a being that desperately wants us to build a deep, personal relationship with Him so that we might be saved from an eternity of torment.&nbsp; In principle, this ought to be as easy as proving the existence of the moon, where all you have to do is look out a window on the appropriate night.&nbsp; <b>Yet one of the very most popular arguments for God’s existence is nothing more than a dubious inference based on obtuse metaphysical quirks</b>.&nbsp; The very nature of the argument itself reeks of its own desperation.<br /><br />But what's most interesting about this argument is the method by which apologists usually make their case.&nbsp; By far, the one, recurring theme from virtually every presentation of this argument is a long, drawn-out tirade about the mysteries of Big Bang cosmology, the metaphysics of causality, and constant reminders that our universe has a definite, finite age.&nbsp; And since universes don't just pop into existence for no reason, there must have been a cause for this event, which science does not understand.&nbsp; It's weird because this is not exactly a controversial claim, yet Christians will still spend hours upon hours belaboring the point anyway.&nbsp; None of it actually furthers a positive case for God, <b>but it does work great as a method for arousing the human need for cognitive closure</b>.<br /><br />It's important to realize that many people are psychologically uncomfortable with the prospect of uncertainty and ambiguity in their beliefs [3,4].&nbsp; It's a well-known cognitive bias that usually manifests as a heavy propensity for primacy - meaning that any hard, immediate answers will be far more preferable than the thought of "I don't know."&nbsp; On top of that, human psychology also has a pervasive bias for spontaneous social attribution [5], meaning that <b>people naturally tend to gravitate toward answers involving the deliberate actions of motivated agents</b>.&nbsp; So it makes perfect sense that apologists tend to ramble on and about the mysteries of Big Bang cosmology, because it psychologically stacks the deck in their favor.&nbsp; There's simply no need to bother with a viable, coherent theory when all you have to do is reinforce the preexisting bias of the audience itself.<br /><br />So without even seriously examining a single premise, the Kalam cosmological argument is already on hopelessly shaky ground.&nbsp; It uses roundabout argumentation to prove what should, in principle, be patently obvious, and then pushes very specific psychological buttons so as to artificially inflate its own appeal.&nbsp; If anything, the only real purpose in criticizing the premises themselves is to see just how hard Christians can fail in one argument while still pretending to have a clue what rational thought even looks like.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />For example, what do you think of when you hear the phrase, “begins to exist?”&nbsp; Because if you’re like most people, you probably think of something like a carpenter as he fashions a table out of wood and nails.&nbsp; The table certainly appears to have a definite beginning to its existence, and it is entirely proper to say that this existence has a cause.&nbsp; However, if you get really technical about it, the carpenter did not actually <i>create</i> anything, so much as <i>rearrange</i> [creatio ex materia].&nbsp; The table only “began to exist” when people suddenly decided to slap a linguistic label onto an arbitrary ordering of material.&nbsp; In fact, this same description is also true for everything in the entire known universe.&nbsp; <b>Anything in human experience that has ever begun to exist has only done so through a physical rearrangement of prior existing stuff.&nbsp; </b>And, as far as we can tell, things which begin to exist in this way don't require the intervention of any magical, disembodied super-fairies.<br /><br />This distinction is important because in the context of Kalam, "begins to exist" literally implies <b>fully discrete bundles of matter and energy just poofing into existence out of pure, absolute nothingness</b> [creatio ex nihilo]; a phenomenon, mind you, that has absolutely no precedent in all of human understanding!&nbsp; So while it may seem intuitive to suppose that such an event would have a certain chain of causality associated with it, we’re still drawing conclusions about something that simply does not happen.&nbsp; It’s like trying to argue that all unicorns must have fur.&nbsp; It makes no difference how sophisticated your logic may be when you forget the fact that no one has ever truly experienced a physical unicorn.<br /><br />So if apologists seriously want to defend this argument, then the first challenge is to provide a comprehensive list of things that actually “began to exist” according to their definition.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>That way we can at least draw a baseline from which to connect with real world events and then infer any potential patterns of causality.&nbsp; But the plain fact of the matter is <b>they have no such list.</b>&nbsp; And how could they?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>The idea itself is barely even coherent.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>How does a thing which exists causally influence "nothing" to do anything?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Yet when pressed on this exact challenge, the apologist merely dismisses the entire objection out of hand, like you're some kind of moron for even pointing it out.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>For example [6,7],<br /><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">"<i>They say nothing ever begins to exist, because everything has material out of which it’s constituted, and those atoms and particles existed before the thing did, and so nothing ever begins to exist, the first premise is false. And I think, what is the matter with these people? Have I always existed? Didn’t I begin to exist at the moment, say, when my father’s sperm and my mother’s egg came into union? If so, where was I? Was I around during the Jurassic age when the dinosaurs were about? Have I always existed? That is so absurd to think that I never began to exist, even though the material stuff out of which I am made existed before me. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp;</span>So I don’t know what’s the matter with these people</i>."</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">So yes, according to the leading proponents of this exact argument, the very best examples we have of true creations of out nothing are, in fact, creations out of something.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp;<b> </b></span><b>It's a wholly dishonest dodge that just side-steps the issue entirely by hiding behind a smoke screen of arrogant condescension and blatant equivocation</b>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Yet Christians will still insist that the entirety of the cosmos itself must have a definite "beginning" to its existence, prior to which there was only a perfect void of raw, absolute nothingness - literally no matter, no energy, no space, no time, and no anything else in-between or beyond.<br /><br />Bear in mind now that when we talk about the earliest moments of the Big Bang, we’re talking about a realm of pitiful human ignorance; a realm where every naive intuition we have about the nature of space and time is completely wrong and inapplicable; a realm where you can't even hold a meaningful conversation without first subjecting yourself to years of training in graduate-level physics and mathematics.&nbsp; So it doesn't matter what you think you know, because any conclusions you may ever hope to reach about the ultimate nature of everything is little more than a wild guess.&nbsp; Yet apologists will still insist that fancy, rhetorical word games are all it takes to support their naive theological conclusions.&nbsp; For example [8]:</div></div><ol><li>A temporal series of events is a collection formed by successive addition.</li><li>A collection formed by successive addition cannot be an actual infinite.</li><li>Therefore a temporal series of events cannot be an actual infinite.</li></ol><div style="text-align: justify;">Or, to put it another way, if time can't go back forever, then "nothing" must have preceded it. &nbsp;But notice how this is just another a dubious philosophical argument being used to support a dubious philosophical argument.&nbsp; And, to make matters even more embarrassing, it's based on an implied assumption about time that is completely false.&nbsp; Because when apologists speak of time in this context, they imagine a distinct, linear construct with an all-encompassing past, present, and future.&nbsp; It's a naive view that certainly fits our natural intuition, but it's still dead wrong.&nbsp; Anyone who knows anything about modern physics knows that there is no such thing as time, but rather a distinct, 4-dimensional construct known as spacetime.&nbsp; And even this view of time is known to be incomplete, because it fails to coherently merge itself with quantum mechanics.&nbsp; <br /><br />It's bewildering how guys with actual PhDs can argue at length, and with such confidence, over a scientific field they don't even understand.&nbsp; But it gets even worse, because the whole thing is a complete non sequitur anyway. &nbsp;<b>Just because the universe has a definite spacetime boundary in the finite past, that does not automatically imply literal nothingness is the only viable precedent.</b>&nbsp; At best, all it shows is that there are apparently other physical realms beyond our observable, four-dimensional spacetime.&nbsp; And so what?&nbsp; Even if we conceded every last claim up this point, there's still nothing that even remotely hints at the necessity for a deliberate, supernatural agent.&nbsp; But rather than humbly acknowledge their ineptitude and just stop right here, apologists simply power the argument through to its bitter end [9].<br /><br />"<i>Now as the cause of space and time, this being must be an uncaused, timeless, spaceless, immaterial being of unfathomable power. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp;</span>Moreover, it must be personal as well.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Why?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Well, first of all because this event must be beyond space and time.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Therefore it cannot be physical or material.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Now there are only two kinds of things that fit that description; either abstract objects like numbers or an intelligent mind.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>But abstract objects can't cause anything.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Therefore it follows that the cause of the universe is a personal transcendent mind.</i>"<br />&nbsp; </div><div style="text-align: justify;">No kidding!&nbsp; So the only philosophically viable way for an entire universe to just pop into being out of nothing is through the incantation of an all-powerful, transcendent, eternal consciousness that necessarily exists outside of space and time [who, of course, just so happens to be Yahweh, the omnipotent God of the Bible].<br /><br />Notice again how Christians simply take Platonic realism for granted - as if numbers literally "exist" in some transdimensional realm outside of spacetime.&nbsp; But now they take it one step further to a concept known as <b>substance dualism</b> - the idea that conscious minds are comprised of a special "substance" that exists independently of physical matter.&nbsp; It’s another one of those tempting philosophies that sounds really cool on paper, but is still completely wrong [10].&nbsp; There is simply no physical way to store information and exercise decisions without some kind of material network to accommodate the process.&nbsp; That's why every "mind” in human experience has always required a physical brain to go along with it, and there is no indication whatsoever for any magical substance beyond spacetime that facilitates this phenomenon.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />Remember that this is supposed to be a rock-solid, irrefutable argument for the existence of God derived from modern cosmology itself.&nbsp; Yet the whole thing is little more than a frantic ejaculation of wild speculation based on naive, untestable rhetoric.&nbsp; There's just so much that's so wrong that you almost don't even know where to begin.&nbsp; For example,</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><ol><li>Didn't we just spend half of this argument concluding that literal nothingness is the only viable precedent to our observable spacetime?&nbsp; So why does God get to exist in a realm beyond of our observable spacetime?</li><li>Furthermore, <b>how exactly are disembodied minds supposed to causally influence the physical world</b> any more than an abstract object?&nbsp; Because last time I checked, "pure force of will" was not a viable mechanism for creating entire universes out of nothing.</li><li>Or better yet, why is it only one, singular agent and not a committee of seventeen?<b>&nbsp; </b>Seriously,<b> what physically verifiable feature of reality would change if we made this an argument for polytheism instead of monotheism</b>?&nbsp; Or what if we just replaced "God" with "a race of powerful, transdimensional aliens with awesome technology?"</li></ol>We can do this all day!&nbsp; The entire argument is so completely ridiculous that you can't even bother critiquing it anymore - you sit back and admire the sheer self-delusion it must take to push this drivel with a straight face.&nbsp; So let's stop beating around the bush and just rewrite the Kalam cosmological argument for what is:<br /><ol><li>Science has yet to devise a viable, pragmatic explanation for why there is something rather than nothing.</li><li>Therefore, God did it.</li></ol>This really is all it boils down to.&nbsp; It's an obvious God-of-the-gaps argument in its most pure and naked form.&nbsp;&nbsp;It makes no verifiable predictions, it confuses the meaning of common expressions, it deliberately equivocates terms, it pretends to know things that can't be known, it makes patently false assumptions, it builds false dichotomies, it contradicts itself, it utilizes dead philosophical ideas, and it makes logical conclusions that don't even necessarily follow from its own premises.&nbsp; Even if we accepted the entire argument outright, we'd still be no closer to understanding <b>how</b> the universe was actually created, what specific being, or beings, were responsible, or what functional impact any of it could possibly have in any single decision I could ever hope to make.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />It’s like a huge, philosophical onion of wrongness, where every layer you peel off just reveals yet another inexcusable layer of wrong.&nbsp; But none of this matters, because it was never intended to be rationally sound to begin with.&nbsp; It’s an overt psychological ploy designed to exploit our natural aversion to ambiguity and uncertainty by filling the mystery with a culturally familiar agent.&nbsp; And since nothing inspires more awe and uncertainty than the very cosmos itself, Christians will forever have an ace up their sleeves until human beings learn to accept the plain and apparent fact that nobody yet understands how the hell the universe got here. <br /><br /><b>Notes/References:</b></div><ol><li>Carl Sagan, Cosmos Episode 4.</li><li>Craig’s popular formulation of the Kalam cosmological argument.&nbsp; See, for example, <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n2wh179kos0&amp;t=14m23s" target="_blank">Craig VS Wolpert</a>.</li><li>Neuberg, S. L., Judice, T. N., and West, S. G., “<a href="http://psychology.clas.asu.edu/files/What%20the%20Need%20for%20Closure%20Scale%20measures%20and%20what%20it%20does%20not-%20Toward%20differentiating%20among%20related%20epistemic%20motives.pdf" target="_blank">What the Need for Closure Scale Measures and What It Does Not: Toward Differentiating Among Related Epistemic Motives</a>,” <i>Journal of Personality and Social Psychology</i>, Vol 72, No 6, pp 1396-1412 (1997)</li><li>Webster, D. M. and Kruglanski, A. W., “Individual Differences in Need for Cognitive Closure,” <i>Journal of Personality and Social Psychology</i>, Vol 67, No 6 (1994)</li><li>See “<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QwP9QusSxfc">Psychology of Belief, Part 9: Agenticity"</a> </li><li>William Lane Craig: <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6gpJuztzOH4&amp;t=2m30s" target="_blank">Why is Richard Dawkins so Popular?</a></li><li>William Lane Craig: <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0qn5V6Cgg1o&amp;t=0m40s" target="_blank">Worst Objection to the Kalam Cosmological Argument</a></li><li><a href="http://www.reasonablefaith.org/forming-an-actual-infinite-by-successive-addition" target="_blank">Forming an actual infinite by successive addition</a>.</li><li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n2wh179kos0&amp;t=14m38s" target="_blank">William Lane Craig</a></li><li>See "<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RS4PW35-Y00">Substance Dualism</a>" by QualiaSoup for a nice discussion.&nbsp; </li></ol><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div>AnticitizenXhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05041380277822761284noreply@blogger.com4